India's Telecom Commission has approved a recommendation which allows the Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) spectrum holders to offer voice calls services on their network by paying an additional fee of Rs 1,658 crore each, reports PTI (via The Economic Times). Note that we weren't able to find any related note on the DoT website at the time of writing this article. While the recommendation has been approved by the telecom commission, a formal approval is necessary by the Department of Telecom (DoT). Frankly however, this development was expected considering the recently introduced telecom policy which is expected to be implemented in 2013, allows operators to offer voice services through 4G or BWA, whenever an appropriate regulatory framework for progressive liberalization of spectrum utilization is established in the country. Telecom secretary R Chandrashekhar stated that if this recommendation gets an approval from DoT, a framework for the new licenses would be implemented by the end of this financial year, as indicated by the report. Besides this, the report also stated that the telecom commission has deferred its decision on a single entity providing both telecom and television services like mobile calling services, DTH, cable TV that could charge customers for all these services through a single bill. Implications One of the biggest gainers from this development will be Reliance Industries (RIL), since it will allow them to bundle voice service along with data services when it starts its 4G service rollout in the country later this year. In December 2012, reports suggested that RIL was all set to get DoT's nod to test voice services on its 4G networks. The department had…
