Lt. Gen. Dr. S.P. Kochhar, DG, COAI on Refarming of Spectrum

Lt. Gen. Dr. S.P. Kochhar, Director General, COAI

“We are very pleased to note the announcement made by the Hon’ble Minister of Communications, Shri Jyotiraditya M. Scindia during the DIGICOM 2025 event, that the ongoing exercise for refarming spectrum for IMT services by a Committee of Secretaries has been completed in the first phase, and that the Cabinet has approved the reallocation of 687 MHZ of spectrum for IMT. The COAI has forcefully and logically propagated that the Indian ecosystem requires 2000 MHz of spectrum for IMT, and we are very happy to note from the Minister’s address that this quantity has been accepted by the Cabinet under the advice of the Minister of Communications and  that they have already allocated the spectrum that takes our holding to 320 MHz in the first phase, thus leaving a deficit of around 400 MHz which should be made up in the subsequent submissions by the Committee of Secretaries, to the cabinet.

It is extremely heartening to know that concrete steps have been taken and are being taken to firstly, recognize our demand of 2000 MHz for the IMT band, and actually taking strategic steps to allocate part of it to IMT immediately and continue this exercise so that 2000 MHz can be achieved.

This will enable rollout and providing of better 5G services to the entire nation at large, which is the broad aim of the Government and the industry. COAI thanks the MOC for choosing the DIGICOM Summit 2025 platform to make these important announcement and we look forward to working together to further fill up the gaps that will propel the 5g services to the optimum level.”

-Lt. Gen. Dr. S.P. Kochhar, Director General, COAI