"TIA urges India [ Images ] to reevaluate the basis with regard to license application fees, capitalisation requirements and bank guarantees since it applies to telecommunications service provider licences, " the Telecommunications Industry Association said inside a memorandum submitted to the US Trade Representative.
TIA, that is the top-most industry body of America's telecommunications sector and it is deeply interested in the vast potential being offered by India with this field, said as a general matter, application fees should reflect the price of processing an application.
"While bank guarantees are appropriate within limited cases, such requirements should reflect the scope of business meant to be offered and should be a temporary, not long term requirement, " it said.
"India should seek to reduce high licencing fees and capitalisation requirements as they reduce the quantity of resources available to service providers to invest in creating out their networks and connecting India's vast population, inch the TIA said.
In its letter, dated October 3, TIA also urged the federal government to continue to engage with India on the government's proposed policy associated with in-country security assurance testing and facility inspection and black-listing of foreign telecom products due to security concerns.
TIA said it is very concerned within the discriminatory policy proposals that India is contemplating, which are targeted at increasing manufacturing and innovation in the ICT sector which this signals a reversal of the generally open-market and pro-competitive policies India has had in this sector.
"In addition to the negative consequences for meeting India's ICT connectivity goals and hampering its capability to benefit from global collaboration, these policies run counter to India's longstanding international trade commitments underneath the WTO, its national treatment obligations under the GATT, and it is G20 pledge in 2008 not to increase barriers in order to trade, " TIA said.
Non-discriminatory, technology-neutral and incentive-based policies are better than discriminatory policies that favour one producer over another, this said.
It also expressed its opposition to the Planning Commission's draft proposal for 30 percent of all electronic procurements by the government be set aside for domestically manufactured products.
"If implemented, this policy will undermine the country's capability to innovate, will impose discriminatory and unrealistic requirements on companies trying to sell to the Indian government, will increase the Indian government's own costs by restricting procurement options and can violate critical commitments that the government of India has designed to resist trade and investment protectionism, " the TIA stated.
TIA noted that despite the global economic slowdown, India remains one of the world's fastest growing ICT markets.
Because 2006, India's total wireline and wireless telephone subscribers possess increased from approximately 164 million to over 846 zillion, representing almost 416 per cent growth in five many years.
The number of people with broadband internet connections (> 256 kbps) is continuing to grow by over 500 per cent since August, 2006, in order to over 11 million subscribers, yet the number of connections remains low in accordance with the population.