Auction for 5G spectrum to commence around June this year, says minister Ashiwini Vaishnaw

If you are waiting for 5G in India, you might have to wait just a tad bit more. 5G network rollout is expected to commence in 2023 keeping the latest report in mind. Earlier, it was expected to roll out in 2022, however, according to Mr. Ashiwini Vaishnaw, the Telecom Minister of India said that the 5G spectrum auction is due in the second half of this year.

Mr. Vaishnaw has given a timeline according to which, the 5G network auction is expected to be held in early June 2022. This will set up the base for the upcoming 5G rollout from participating major telecom carriers such as Reliance Jio, Airtel, and Vi among others. The auction arrives at a base price of 7.5 lac crore across multiple frequency bands allocated over a period of 30 years. With that being said, Digital Communications Commissions will take TRAI recommendations and decide the plan of action.

The auction base price according to the watchdogs is at 7.5 Lac crore for the 1 lac MHz spectrum that the government allocates for 30 years while the pricing comes at 5.07 lac crore for 20 years of the allocated timeline. TRAI slashed the pricing for spectrum compared to last year by about 39%, however, it is being said that the pricing is still higher than the global benchmarks so far.

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