Articles by Rohit Prasad

After a command and control paradigm of spectrum management lasting from 2001 to 2008, India has gone in for a phased transition to a liberalised regime. Notable elements of this change include the unbundling of spectrum from the service licence, the choice of the auction mechanism for the assignment of spectrum and the freedom to use a spectrum block with any technology. However, elements of the current scenario of spectrum markets in India indicate that there remains an unfinished agenda in spectrum liberalisation. These include a high price of spectrum compared to international benchmarks, low spectrum holding per operator, and vast tracts of unutilised spectrum in rural areas. The lacunae in the current framework of spectrum management leading to persisting inefficiencies are elaborated upon and solutions proposed.

The Common Service Centre scheme aims to establish nearly three lakh rural internet kiosks across India. A recent evaluation study, however, found poor demand among users and delayed roll-out of government-to-consumer services, causing losses and attrition among private operators of the scheme. There is space, therefore, for greater engineering of public good outcomes by tying financial incentives to computer education goals.

The granting of universal access service licences in 2007 at a price equal to that revealed by the spectrum auctions of 2001 has proved very controversial. An economic model for spectrum pricing is developed in this article, to evaluate the various claims made in this debate. The estimation exercise shows that the value of spectrum was much higher than the fees charged, even allowing for the cost of capital.