TRAI Chairman Justice Sodhi said that the meeting today was too preliminary for any conclusions to be drawn and included just an exchange courtesies. The meeting has however assumed importance as despite directions from the former Cabinet Secretary T S R Subramaniam last year insisting on a monthly informal interaction between officials on both sides, only one such meeting took place almost ten months ago.

The impasse between the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and the TRAI has now become legendary in telecom circles with the TRAIhaving pushed into a corner ever since the recent High Court judgement in July curtailed the latter's powers by refusing to allow its jurisdiction to interfere in the licensing rights of the DoT. This has left the TRAI virtually with no powers to interfere in any disputes that pivate operators in the field of basic, cellular and paging services, and the DOT on encashment of bank guarantees for delayed licence fee payments.

Before this, in February, the TRAI had acted tough with the DoT staying its proceedings in announcing the new internet policy, encashing bank guarantees of operators defaulting on licence fee payments and going as far as cancelling the licence issued by the DoT to the Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL) for allowing it entry in the field of cellular services. This had forced the DoT to drag the TRAi to court to get the jurisdiction of the authority sorted out.

In the words of Sodhi himself, the TRAI has been reduced to being a "toothless wonder". He says, the government has to have itsobjectives clear in forming a regulatory authority - it has to be an independent forum, expeditious in settling disputes and inexpensive for disputing parties to approach. If these are the objectives of any regulator then this is how these bodies should be allowed to function.

Whether today's meeting will herald a new chapter in the TRAI-DoT relations, only time will tell, but for the moment industry hopes are high.