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According to recommendations of the sub-committee, the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Information Technology (IT) has directed the IT Ministry to speed up the process to auction 3G licenses by hiring international consultant.

For which, ProPakistani has learned, a meeting of the Auction Supervisory Committee (ASC) is scheduled today to finalize modalities for hiring international consultant to award 3G licenses.

Standing committee unanimously approved the recommendations of the sub-committee primarily aimed at ensuring transparency in the process of 3G license bidding. The committee directed the ministry to expedite the auction process in the light of recommendations submitted by the sub-committee and approved by the main committee.

The international consultant, once appointed, would determine and review the auction process from scratch.

PTA was further directed to follow the best international practices in awarding 3-G contracts and with the objective of maximizing revenue, efficiency and competitiveness in the best national interest.

The PTA must observe the performance and financial viability of existing mobile phone companies before considering them to qualify for the bidding process. The Ministry of IT was recommended to ensure that infrastructure sharing is mandatory for the license holders to avoid environment pollution and encourage economies of scale.

The PTA was suggested to avoid awarding more than one block to one operator as this would be anti-competitive. Alternatively, PTA must impose the condition to launch 4-G technology on two blocks brought by any one operator.

The PTA should make criteria for appointment of international consultant transparent as well as complete the hiring process at the earliest so that the auction process of 3G could be completed without further delay.