Despite strong opposition from telecom operators and denying a High Court ruling, the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission on Sunday issued a Wi-Max licence to Bangladesh Internet Exchange Ltd (BIEL) for its brand Ollo without any competitive auction.
The bench of Justice Mirza Hussain Haider and Justice Khurshid Alam Sarker on November 17 issued the ruling, asking the post and telecommunication secretary and the BTRC chairman why the decision to give BIEL the Wi-Max licence should not be declared illegal.
Officials at the BTRC told the Dhaka Tribune that the telecom regulator had awarded the licence in a hurry the next week.
When contacted on Monday, Md Ali Morshed, a regulatory adviser of Ollo Wireless Internet, also confirmed that they got the licence.
Meanwhile, BIEL had deposited 50% of the Tk1.41bn licence fee on Wednesday, including VAT, and it had to deposit the remaining fee within the next two weeks, a high official of the BTRC told the Dhaka Tribune, requesting anonymity.
The BTRC had fixed a licence fee of Tk2.46bn for Ollo with 20MHz spectrum on the 2,600 band.
On September 8, the regulator had sold the same type of spectrum at Tk1.55bn per megahertz.
Industry experts have calculated a loss of at least Tk30bn public money incurred by the government through awarding of the Wi-Max licence to Ollo.
Replying to a query, Md Abubakar Siddique, secretary of the telecommunications ministry, told the Dhaka Tribune on Monday: “The previous minister approved the recommendations of the BTRC and the ministry has nothing do about BIEL or any Wi-Max licence.”
Mobile operators had demanded an open auction for the 2600 band of spectrum and allow them to participate in it.
To award the licence to BIEL, the government frequently amended the related guideline. It also changed the nature of the spectrum, having earlier fixed unpaired spectrum for Wi-Max but later allocating costlier paired spectrum through a wrong method, another high official claimed.
Ollo, a brand of BIEL and the New Generation Graphics Limited (NGGL) – both now owned by the Russian company Multinet – applied for a Wi-Max licence in April this year. The NGGL was allocated 20MHz spectrum on 800 band free of cost in 2011.
The two companies have so far enjoyed a total of 54MHz in three different bands, which has made them the most influential operator in the country.
BIEL already imported equipment for the LTE – long-term evolution, a fourth generation telephone and mobile broadband communication standard – even before getting the licence.
It had attended an auction of Wi-Max licence in September 2008, but it withdrew from the competition just after the auction ended and withdrew Tk30m of the earnest money although the BTRC offered them a licence.
Legal experts said as BIEL withdrew the earnest money, the auction was “dead” and if the government wanted to award any new licence, it has to arrange another auction.
