JPC to train guns on all former Telecom Secretaries

New Delhi, Jul 27: The Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) headed by PC Chacko is all set to question all Telecom Secretaries who have served since the NDA rule in the country. The NDA regime too fell under the probing agency's radar when it emerged that the UPA was merely following telecom policies that were in place during the NDA regime.

The JPC is believed to be looking into the migration policy for cellular operators and will record statements of A V Gokak, who served as Telecom Secretary between the period Nov 1996 and Aug 1998. On Thursday, the JPC will record as evidence the statement of Gokak's successor Anil Kumar, who was Telecom Secretary during the time frame Aug 1998 and Feb 2000.

The NDA government was named when the 2G spectrum scam broke out after they were found responsible for implementing the migration policy that allowed mobile operators to move from a fixed licence fee regime to revenue-sharing model. The method was implemented during Kumar's regime in Jun 1999. The Department of Telecom has assessed the losses of this policy change at Rs 43,523.92 crore.

The JPC had also questioned former Telecom Regulatory Authority of India Chairman M S Verma earlier. The committee is also likely to summon former Telecom Ministers including Arun Shourie, A Raja and Dayanidhi Maran on their telecom policies under their rule.

The JPC will look into India's telecom pricing policy from 1998-2008 that will also include the BJP-led NDA government who was in power during the period 1998-2004.

OneIndia News