Reliance Petro applies for mobile radio trunking

Mukesh Ambani-controlled Reliance Petroleum has applied for a captive mobile radio trunking (CMRTS) licence for its Gujarat refinery. If approved, the licence will enable the company to operate its own telecom services "" both fixed and wireless "" in the special economic zone (SEZ) at Jamnagar.

With a closed user group (CUG) providing CMRTS (mobile-like) services within the premises, Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), Reliance Petroleum's promoter company, will set up a telecom network of its own. This will help the Mukesh Ambani to bounce back into telecom.

CMRTS is a CUG service and Reliance Petroleum had filed for the network licence on September 7 this year with the Department of Telecommunications (DoT).

According to the filing, the company is looking at providing CUG services for its greenfield petroleum refinery that is being set up at the SEZ in Jamnagar.

The refinery complex will have 18 plants operating round-the-clock and the company has sought for the permission to provide secure communications among its units.

CUG would help Reliance Petroleum to combine multiple plants under one system and due to its efficient channel usage, it provides quick access to channels in case of emergency, it said in the filing.

Earlier, RIL had also begun installing a 7,000-km long optic fibre cable (OFC) for its communication purposes in south India. The OFC network was being set up in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Gujarat and was to run alongside its Kakinada-Bharuch gas pipeline.

Highly-placed executives at the Reliance Communications (controlled by Anil Ambani), opined that a telecom foray of this nature is against the letter and spirit of the demerger agreement.