Big boost to Elon Musk’s Starlink as India opts for spectrum allotment

The Indian government will allocate spectrum for satellite broadband administratively and not through auction, ignoring demands from local telecom operators including Sunil Bharti Mittal-led Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio.

Clarifying on satellite spectrum allocation, Union telecom minister Jyotiraditya Scindia says the Telecom Act passed in December 2023 has very clearly stated that for satcom spectrum will be allocated administratively. Scindia, however, says it does not mean that spectrum will come without a cost.

This comes hours after Elon Musk called the auction route proposed by Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance as "unprecedented".

The cost and formula of costing are going to be will be decided by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), says Scindia.

“There is a paper that has already been circulated by TRAI. The regulatory authority of telecom has been empowered by the Constitution to decide what that administrative pricing is going to be. I am very confident that they will come up the best pricing that should be adopted, provided that it’s being given in an administrative manner,” the Union minister says.

Referring to practices across the globe, Scindia says satellite spectrum across the world is allocated administratively. “India is not doing anything different from the rest of the world. Conversely, if you do decide to auction it, then you will be doing something which is different from the rest of the world,” he says.

There are a number of issues that go into making that decision which is why globally all countries in the world have followed a certain model and India is doing pretty much the same, the minister says.

Scindia’s remarks came hours after Bharti Enterprises chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal said telecom companies will take satellite services into the remotest part of the nation. “Those satellite companies who have ambitions to come into urban areas and serve elite retail customers just need to take the telecom licences like everybody else, be bound with the same conditions. They need to buy spectrum as telecom companies buy. They need to pay the licence fee as telecom companies do and also secure the networks like telecom companies do,” Mittal said. “This is a simple solution which can be done on a global scale and India can again show the way.”

“With the launch of sat com services, anybody anywhere in the country, however remote, will be able to connect on a fast speed network to the internet,” said Mittal. 5% Indians live in remote mountains and forests, he said.

Reliance Jio, too, had reportedly written to the telecom minister opposing the allocation of satellite broadband and favoured the auction route. 

In November 2023, Airtel-backed Eutelsat OneWeb India became the first private entity to receive regulatory clearance to launch commercial satellite connectivity services in India.