The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) yesterday released a consultation paper on ‘Reserve Prices for Auction of FM Radio Channels’, which highlights that the FM network will be expanded to 18 additional cities and towns.

The regulator said that the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) had in March sought its recommendations on reserve price for auction of FM radio channels in 18 cities and towns in the states of Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and the Union Territory (UT) of Jammu & Kashmir for the expansion of private FM Radio.

The government has decided to introduce a new category (‘E’) of places for expansion.

“This Consultation Paper has been prepared to seek the comments/views of the stakeholders on the determination of reserve prices for auction of FM Radio channels, under FM Phase-Ill Policy.,” TRAI added in its statement.

As per the existing FMPhase-III policy guidelines, the cities are divided into ‘A+’, ‘A’, ‘B’, ‘C’, ‘D’ and ‘Others’ categories based on the population of a city. For each city category technical parameters have been specified in the policy guidelines.

One of the points in the consultation paper states that due to the non-availability of an updated radio listenership data and Market Intensity Index, whether the data as used in 2020 recommendation could be used in the present exercise as well.