The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is reportedly planning to ask the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) to determine the areas without mobile coverage. The department intends to use the data for effective designing of the next spectrum auction. The data collected by TRAI will be used to review the current mobile penetration in rural areas and the spectrum winners will be mandated to comply with the rollout obligation norms in these areas.

TRAI has already discovered that 9,000 villages in the Northeastern region do not have mobile connectivity. The regulator will now assess the remaining areas, especially those in Jammu & Kashmir, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh.

The telecom department has reportedly estimated that there are about 40,000 uncovered villages, excluding those in the Northeast region. It has further projected the cost of providing 2G coverage in this region to be over Rs 110 billion.