Patil panel puts telecom ministry in the dock over 2G -Governance Now

Patil panel puts telecom ministry in the dock over 2G

Faults the DoT for ignoring law ministry advice and not seeking finance ministry's concurrence on the then spectrum norms

GN Bureau | February 5, 2011

The one-member committee of retired supreme court judge Shivraj Patil has faulted the department of telecom (DoT) for first seeking opinion of the law ministry on the procedure for the 2G spectrum allocation and then ignoring it.

It also noted that DoT should have sought finance ministry's concurrence on going ahead with the distribution if the entry fee had not been revised to reflect the opportunity cost between 2004 and 2008 (UPA's first term) and when the competitive bidding to determine the entry fee was not followed.

The committee could not trace the order which instructed the advancing of the last date for receipt of applications from October 1, 2007 to September 25, 2007. Procedures formulated for the purpose are "not traceable either to powers vested in terms of any procedure laid out or satisfies the requisites of law, in particular, the principles of objectivity, fairness of transparency," the committee noted.

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