Defence ministry says it cannot vacate spectrum before two years

New Delhi: The ministry of defence (MoD) has questioned the department of telecommunication''s assurance to the operators that 40 MHz of spectrum would be vacated by July.

The MoD has said that setting up an exclusive fibre network for the Army would require shifting to an alternative spectrum band. This would take at least two years and a cost of over Rs4,000 crore.

(Earlier, after its meeting with the armed forces, the Bharat Sanchar Nigam had said that laying an exclusive fibre network for the armed forces would require an additional cost of Rs1,500 crore, escalating the project cost to Rs3,076 crore, only for the Army. The total project cost for the three services is expected to be Rs4,000 crore.)

This is nearly four times that of the DoT-sanctioned fund — Rs980 crore — for the armed forces'' exclusive project.

The MoD has also told DoT that since spectrum could be released only after the completion of the new fibre network, giving a deadline for the 40 Mhz spectrum to be vacated and assuring the operators of the availability of the spectrum is not desirable.