Telecom sector not to lay 'golden egg'

New Delhi (PTI): Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal on Wednesday said the "golden goose" of telecom sector will not lay the golden egg "for a little while", thanks to the Supreme Court judgement. A He also said that if courts were to involve themselves in economic policy making then "we are in dire trouble".

"Telecom was the golden goose which laid the golden egg. The Supreme Court ensured that the golden goose will never lay golden egg again for a little while," he said while speaking at Annual General Meeting and National Conference 2013 organised by CII (rpt) CII.

Sibal was speaking on governance issues in the country. Though the minister did not mention any specific order of the apex court, but he was apparently referring to the spectrum allocation case of 2008 in which all the 122 2G telecom licences were cancelled by the apex court in February last year."Between 2010 and 2013 with all the experiments, with all the court verdicts, with the Rs 1,76,000 crore, we got into our kitty just Rs 1,000 crore," he said.

Foreign Direct investments in the telecom sector plummeted by 96 per cent to USD 70.46 million in the April- November 2012 period, from USD 1,987.18 million during the same period a year ago. Sibal said no one -- consumers, industry and government, benefitted from the court order.

He said the telecom sector was opened up in 1994 for private players and it has been learning through its experience.