India's sixth-biggest mobile phone firm by users, Tata Teleservices has announced that it surrendering a large part of the CDMA mobile airwaves to the government.

The company said that it is giving up the CDMA spectrum under protest against the central government, which has announced a decision to impose a one-time fee. Tata Teleservices, which is a part of the Tata group and is 26% owned by Japan's NTTDoCoMo, informed the authorities that it will surrender all airwaves beyond the 2.5 MHz limit in 15 telecom circles in the country.

The company has decided not to give up excess spectrum in Delhi and Mumbai circles, where it retains 3.75 MHz and it is paying a surcharge to the government. It is believed that the government might force other firms to either surrender excess spectrum or pay a surcharge for holding excess spectrum.

The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) of the government of India has asked the companies to pay the fine amounting to about Rs. 3,033 crore as they hold more airwaves that allotted by the government. It said in an order that all CDMA players holding more than 2.5 Mhz in 800 Mhz band will have to pay the one-time fee from 01-01-2013. The order also said that the charge will be imposed on additional spectrum for the remaining license period.

The DoT also said that the telecom service providers who are not willing to pay the one-time fees will have to surrender the additional spectrum above2.5 Mhz. It has announced the one time spectrum fee for each megahertz of frequencies on the basis of the reserve price from the auction on March 11.