The Indian mobile phone subsidiary of Sistema, Sistema Shyam TeleServices has won the right to operate in eight telecommunication zones in India. The bid for the airwaves total 36.39 billion rupees according to Indian Telecommunications Ministry, R Chandrashekhar.
India is undertaking spectrum auctions and stakes sales in government controlled companies to lower its overall deficit of 5.2% of the GDP in 2013 to 4.8% in 2014. There is still difficulty in selling its airwaves to carriers saddled by heavy debt burdens and have avoided the bidding since these firms view the base prices as too high. As a result, the projected sale of two frequency bands used by operators in GSM technology has been scrapped because of the lack of bidders.
The bid award comes after Sistema Shyam Teleservices had twenty one of its permits revoked after the Indian Supreme Court cancelled the award of a scandal ridden process in 2008. Sistema Shyam operates the Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) platform.
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