The Department of Telecom said on Monday that both basic and cellular operators supported raising the cap on foreign direct investment to 74 per cent, but pointed out that the issue was still under consideration and a decision would be taken within a month.
Terming it as an "internal meeting", Telecom secretary Vinod Vaish said after a two-hour long meeting with telecom operators in New Delhi said the DoT had sought the views of the telecom operators on the issue of FDI.
He said the industry's support on the FDI issue stemmed from the fact that investments required in the telecom sector were huge and "unless we liberalise, we will not be able to get that kind of investments.
He said there was "no link" between the Unified Licencing regime issue and the FDI cap.
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Vaish's comments come in the wake of reports that some operators are holding informal talks to reach a consensus by linking the unified telecom licences and the issue of FDI cap.
On unified licencing regime, Vaish said, "Government has no views at this point of time. The new telecom policy is in force and the Convergence Bill is in Parliament, we have to act within that framework."