''Govt had decided to cancel S-band tender last year''

Mumbai, Feb 8 (PTI) The government had last yeardecided to cancel the 2005 agreement between ISRO arm Antrixand private company Devas Multimedia, Maharashtra ChiefMinister Prithviraj Chavan said today.

"I remember that this issue came up in 2010 and it wasdecided to cancel the tender," Chavan, the former Science andTechnology minister, told reporters in Sangli.

"In 2010, when I was member of the (Space) Commission,this issue came up. I recall that some decisions on the issuewere taken in 2005.

"The Commission had decided to cancel (the tender)...

I am sure it must have been cancelled. But I am not aware ofthis..because I did not handle the issue," he said.

"This issue came up before us when I was a member ofthe Commission but I did not handle the space departmentissues," Chavan added.

Recent reports said the CAG has been scrutinising a2005 deal between Antrix, the commercial arm of the IndianSpace Research Organisation (ISRO), and Devas multimedia.

Earlier in the day, the Prime Minister''s Office haddenied media reports alleging that the government had incurredlosses in allocation of S-band spectrum, saying no decisionhas been taken on the issue and hence charges of revenue losswere without basis.

Media reports had stated that the Department of Space,which comes directly under the Prime Minister, had allocated70 MHz of S-Band spectrum to Devas Multimedia at Rs 1,000crore for 20 years. According to the reports, the actual valueof this was estimated to be around Rs 2 lakh crore.