Having faced thorough embarrassment after the Supreme Court cancelled all the 122 2G licences that the UPA had issued on the ground that the procedure to dole out these licences was “fundamentally flawed”, the Government now wants to save face by exploring the option of challenging the verdict through a review petition.
There is nothing wrong per se in doing so — adverse verdicts are frequently challenged — but what is becoming increasingly clear is that the Government still remains in denial mode and doggedly refuses to accept that the manner in which the then Telecom Minister, A Raja, doled out 2G licences was fundamentally flawed. From this flows its refusal to accept accountability for the criminal misdeeds of A Raja resulting in a mind-boggling loss to the exchequer.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his colleagues have all along been brazen about refusing to acknowledge the Great 2G Spectrum Robbery. On more than one occasion, senior Ministers have brushed aside the overwhelming evidence of the loot under Mr Singh’s watch; one of them has even made the astounding claim that there was “zero loss” to the exchequer. For the Prime Minister to now consider contesting the Supreme Court’s order is, therefore, not surprising.
But what is amazing is the determination with which Mr Singh and his advisers refuse to read the writing on the wall. The fact that the court has cancelled all the licences and not just of those firms that are said to have engaged in malpractices in collaboration with Raja, shows that the very procedure adopted for issuing the licences was and remains suspect. If the Government had got that simple message right, it would not have persisted with wasting its time on contemplating further litigation.
Instead, it would have focussed on how to get out of the mess of its own making by doing the right thing. Since the court has unambiguously said that licences have to be auctioned, the Government must ask the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India to promptly frame guidelines for this purpose. Anything short of that is unacceptable.
The real challenge before the Government and TRAI is to now work out a base price at which the auction will begin. They have four months to do so. The base price should not be so low that it results in bids which fall short of market expectations. On the other hand, if the Government, propelled by the greed of mopping up windfall revenues to bridge the fiscal deficit, fixes the base rate too high, successful bidders will recover costs by fleecing customers.
Apart from striking an acceptable balance on the floor price, the Government has to sort out other details, one of which is the fate of those companies whose licences have been cancelled and who would want to participate in the auction. To this day, there is no clarity on whether they will be allowed to do so and whether the payment they have made to the Government under the so-called ‘first-come-first-serve’ regime, will be adjusted accordingly.
The TRAI’s guidelines must offer clarity on these issues. Finally, there is one thing that Mr Singh must do since the Supreme Court has slammed officials in the Prime Minister’s Office for sitting on the request of a citizen for granting approval to prosecute Raja. He must immediately act against the errant officials. Mr Singh should have done so by now, but given the manner in which he has failed to act promptly on the 2G scam, that would be expecting too much from him.
