A meeting of the PAC on Monday also decided to include a suggestion to formulate policy on optical fiber and some other issues in the report. [break]
PAC Chairman Ram Krishna Yadav said, “We will soon forward the report to the CIAA, the Ministry of Information and Communications (MoIC), the Office of the Auditor General and Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA).
The committee has asked the authorities to submit monthly reports with updates, as recommended in the report.
The report, which was submitted to the full committee after a year-long study, has concluded that irregularities amounting to billions took place in the awarding of license and frequency allocations by Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA).
Speaking at the meeting, coordinator of the sub-committee Dr. Prakash Chandra Lohani said that lack of clarity in policy and NTA´s irresponsibility had led to irregularities in frequency allocation which cost the country billions in lost revenue.
Lawmaker Shankar Pokharel, a former minister of information and communications, said that awarding a separate license for rural telecom operators was a mistake as they were found eyeing operations in the urban sector with their GSM license after fulfilling the licensing conditions of NTA rather than working for the rural sector. “ Telecom services are expensive in Nepal because of difficult topography and there is no alternative to infrastructure sharing to make it cost-effective,” he added.
The report has asked the regulator to auction the licenses of any new services and also raised questions about the intentions of the then NTA chairmen in assigning frequencies and licenses without aunctioning.
NT and Ncell are using 3G frequency for free and the report reckons that the government can mobilize up to Rs 10 billion from each operator for the 3G service. In order to recover the amount from the two operators, the subcommittee has recommended that PAC fix a specific amount to be levied on the auction of remaining frequencies.
Related story
NTA determines 5G frequency
