Trai wants FDI in Indian telecom sector to grow

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) is aiming at increasing foreign direct investment (FDI) and facilitating speedier mandatory clearances for companies that could give a big leg up to ‘ease of doing business’ in the telecom sector.

“We are looking forward to make business process easier by eliminating multiple clearance process that will also help in bringing more FDI in the telecom space,” Trai chairman RS Sharma told ET, adding that the new set of recommendations would be sent to the government within next two months.

The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has recently issued directions to all departments to bring in enabling framework and regulations in tune with the liberalized FDI policy in order to attract more foreign investment.

Foreign funds in the telecom industry has surged to Rs 65,000 crore or $10 billion in the first three quarters of the 2016-17 fiscal from $2.9 billion in 2015-16, according to government statistics with officials believing more appetite in the sector on the back of ambitious Digital India umbrella program.

“We are looking to bring recommendations to ease out stakeholders that put infrastructure for telecom operators and Internet service providers and require permissions from different departments including states with right of way (RoW) emerging as a main challenge,” the top official said.

Trai had on March 14 issued a consultation paper seeking views from the industry on ‘ease of doing telecom business’ with an objective to identify the bottlenecks or obstacles that were making it difficult to do a telecom business in India and requires regulatory intervention.

Sharma said that the regulator is exploring whether it can facilitate stakeholders to function smoothly without having the need of complex regulatory regime and how additional processes could be eliminated with the advancement in technology.

Telecom watchdog, however through its ongoing consultation process principally looking to address existing licensing issues, spectrum sharing trading approval, and merger and acquisition policy.
However, Trai has on April 11 extended last date for the submission of written comments to April 25.

Early this month, telecom watchdog said that ‘ease of doing business’ was one of its core focus areas and it would bring some stronger suggestions to the table for the government to formulate policy.

The regulator in January, this year has identified few issues hurting the sector’s growth after a closed-door discussion with the service providers that include issues relating to consumer protection, quality of service, level-playing field and financial health.