Paris - The two heads of the troubled French-American telecommunications equipment supplier Alcatel-Lucent, Pat Russo and Serge Tchuruk, have decided to resign, the company announced on Tuesday.

Russo, the company's chief executive officer, is to leave her post by the end of the year but, at the request of the Board of Directors, will run the company until a replacement has been found.

"I am very pleased with the progress we are making especially in light of a difficult market environment," said Pat Russo. "That said, I believe it is the right time for me to step down.

Russia-based Sistema has announced that it will invest over $ 5 billion in Indian telecom sector in the next 3-4 years.

Sistema has finalized a deal with Indian telecom services provider Shyam Telelink, the unlisted telecom services arm of the Shyam Telecom Group, to acquire 74% stake in the company.

Russia has also assured Indian oil firm ONGC that it will become its helping hand for acquiring stake in its giant Sakhalin-3 project.

In an order to promote telephone and broadband services in villages, the Telecom Commission, the policy-making body under the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), has decided to waive the licence fee on rural landline phones besides reducing levy towards the “universal service obligation” (USO) fund.

The decision is also anticipated to give a boost to e-governance through provision of more broadband services in villages, thus reducing the digital divide.

The Cellular Operators’ Association of India (COAI) stated yesterday that the allegations made by CDMA service providers that the GSM operators were provided 2G spectrum against norms were false and baseless.

In a letter issued to the media, COAI said that the entire campaign formed by the CDMA operator’s body which is Association of United Telecom Service Providers of India (AUSPI) was dishonest and misleading.

COAI further claimed that AUSPI had done all that as a desperate attempt to pull down a performing industry. AUSPI had also been accused for forming a “serious misinformation campaign.”

A new direction was given to the war between ESPN and DTH operators over the pricing of sports channel on Tuesday when sector regulator Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) issued a show-ca