3G services in metro will cost atleast 700-900 Rs/monthBharti Airtel , Indian Telecom Market leader cautioned that 3G mobile services will not come cheap, especially for subscribers in metros, as service providers had to pay unexpected heavy fee for spectrum. “Take the example of Delhi itself, or Mumbai. The amount for spectrum that has been charged is close to Rs 3,500 crore.

according to Sunil Mittal, Chairman Bharti Group. “To recover heavy license fees and input cost, it would be charged atleast Rs 700-900 per month,” On the Qs of 3G launch, Mittal said, “We will launch 3G Some time later this year. We are just waiting for the spectrum allocation, which is promised in September, a few months after that.”

In the rest of the circles, specially in the C-category, the tariffs may not be very high. “The pricing of subscriber tariffs have to be based on the input cost. Any industry relies on input cost and here, the input cost is spectrum and it has gone high,” he said.[ad code=2]

Amid highly aggressive bidding for 3G spectrum, Bharti Airtel won 13 circles, including Delhi and Mumbai, paying Rs 12,295.46 crore, the highest among service providers. The company could not achieve the objective of a pan-India 3G foot print as the prices rose beyond a reasonable level due to various factors like the auction format, a severe shortage of spectrum. Apart from Bharti, Two other big players Vodafone and Reliance Communications has also managed to win 3G spectrum in Delhi and Mumbai, which might force Bharti to be in a tariff war in these two metros.