DOT / Telecom License

Telecom licensing in India is now governed by the Telecommunications Act, 2023, which has substantially replaced the colonial-era Indian Telegraph Act, 1885 (along with the Indian Wireless Telegraphy Act, 1933, and the Telegraph Wire (Unlawful Possession) Act, 1950). Vide a Central Government notification dated 21 June 2024, Sections 1, 2, 10 to 30, 42 to 44, 46, 47, 50 to 58, 61 and 62 of the Telecommunications Act, 2023, were brought into force with effect from 26 June 2024, repealing the corresponding Telegraph Act provisions from that date.

Under Section 3(1) of the 2023 Act, prior authorisation from the Central Government (through the Department of Telecommunications) is required to: (a) establish, operate, maintain or expand a telecommunications network; (b) provide telecommunications services; or (c) possess radio equipment. Licences, registrations, or permissions granted earlier under the repealed Telegraph Act/Wireless Telegraphy Act regime continue to be valid for their original definite validity period; where no fixed validity period was specified, they remain valid for five years from the date notified by the DoT.

The historical Unified Licence (UL) and UL-Virtual Network Operator (UL-VNO) framework — covering categories such as Internet Service Provider (ISP), Access Service, and Long Distance authorisations — operated under this transitional regime until the DoT notified Sections 3(1) and 3(6) of the Act on 23 June 2026, replacing the licence-based structure with a new category-based authorisation regime under the Telecommunications (Authorisation for Provision of Principal Telecommunications Services) Rules, 2026, administered through the DoT's centralised eServices portal. Because this authorisation framework is newly in force, prospective applicants should confirm the currently applicable authorisation category and process directly against the DoT eServices portal before filing, rather than relying on the legacy UL/UL-VNO category names.

We assist with licence category assessment, documentation, net worth and technical information collation, and application support for relevant DoT permissions. This is a specialist engagement for telecom, ISP, OSP, cloud communication, or connectivity models.