Supreme Court declines to receive government plea on ‘administrative allocation’ of spectrum

Supreme Court declines to receive application by Centre to allow administrative allocation of spectrum.

The Supreme Court has declined to receive an application by the Centre to allow the administrative allocation of spectrum.

The Registrar found the application for clarification misconceived. Spectrum, a scarce natural resource, is allocated to private players only through open, transparent auction. The law was laid down on this issue by the Supreme Court 12 years ago in the 2G spectrum judgment.

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‘Administrative allocation’ of spectrum would have government in sole charge of selecting operators to distribute airwaves, considered a scarce resource.

The Registrar invoked Order XV Rule 5 of the Supreme Court Rules, 2013 to decline the application.

Under this provision of the 2013 Rules, the Registrar may refuse to receive a petition on the ground that it discloses no reasonable cause or is frivolous or contains scandalous matter. The government has 15 days to appeal to the court.

The application filed by the Union government had said spectrum was assigned not only for commercial telecom services but also for discharge of sovereign and public interest functions such as security, safety, disaster preparedness, etc.