Communications minister Sushma Swaraj told the Lok Sabha during question hour that cellular mobile telephone service (CMTS), which was proposed to be started in four metros in the early 90's, was a new service even by global standards and there was no historical data based on which accurate demand projections could be made.

At best, a rough estimate of the number of subscribers and traffic, in terms of air time generated by them, could be made for fixing licence fee for eight licences granted to private operators, the minister said.

CAG said, the DoT did not make a realistic projection of demand for CMTS and fixed an annual lumpsum licence fee for the first three years on the basis of grossly understated projectionof demand made by one of the bidders. The CAG also contended that DoT has failed to incorporate suitable provisions in the licence pact for charging higher licence fee if actual demand was more than the projections for the first three years.