An empowered group of ministers (EGoM) headed by finance minister P Chidambaram is scheduled to meet on Wednesday to discuss the third round of 2G spectrum auction.



"There will be discussion over the third round of spectrum auction which the department of telecom (DoT) has to conduct to comply with the Supreme Court order," government sources said.

The EGoM will take a call on the number of telecom circles in which spectrum will be auctioned, they added.

The apex court on February 15, 2013, had directed the government to put up the entire spectrum that was freed following cancellation of 122 2G licences for auction.

The government had put on sale 271.25Mhz of spectrum in November 2012. 514.8 Mhz of spectrum was freed after the Supreme Court order last year cancelled 122
licences.

To comply with Supreme Court order, DoT will have to auction airwaves in at least 20 circles.

The department will also have to take the EGoM's approval to auction spectrum in Delhi and Mumbai circles which failed to attract bidders for the second time since November 2012.

The auction is scheduled to start from March 11. The government has received only one application from Sistema Shyam Teleservices for participating
in spectrum auction.

Sources added that there is a possibility of spectrum prices getting reduced in 18 out of 22 telecom circles for which bids were received in the November 2012 auction.

It was also not clear if the spectrum prices in the remaining telecom circles - Delhi, Mumbai, Karnataka and Rajasthan - will be reduced for which there are no bidders in the upcoming auction on March 11.

The government had already reduced the prices of GSM spectrum in these four circles by 30% after there were no bidders in the November auction.