The second day of auction for 2G spectrum began at 9 am today. The auction is for 1800 megahertz spectrum band – currently being used for offering 2G GSM telecom services. Five telecom operators – Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Telenor-promoted Telewings, Videocon and Idea Cellular – had applied for participating in the auction.

AIR Correspondent reports, there were seven rounds of bidding on Monday and demand for 98 out of 176 blocks of spectrum for auction was witnessed. The value of 98 blocks stood at over 9,224 crore rupees at the end of the day. The government had set a bid starting price of 14,000 crore rupees for 5 megahertz of GSM airwave space in all the zones. Two key circles-Delhi and Mumbai-did not receive any bid on the first day. No player has applied for pan-India licences. New players or companies, whose telecom permits were impacted by Supreme Court judgement that cancelled 122 licences, are required to bid for minimum of four blocks. Existing players can bid for maximum of two blocks.