Mumbai: Sunil Mittal's Bharti Airtel has offered to pay the government Rs2,650 crore for an additional spectrum of 4.4 MHz across 23 telecom circles in the country and told the government that the company was willing to participate in an auction for scarce spectrum.

Bharti's offer of Rs2,650 crore as the initial bid amount for 4.4 MHz of pan-India GSM spectrum is Rs1,000 crore higher than what the government has asked Reliance Communications to pay for country-wide GSM licence.

''Considering the urgency of the matter for us to attend to the quality of network needs of the customers and the massive future growth, we herewith offer a sum of Rs 2,650 crore. Furthermore, we would like to reserve the right to increase this bid in the event of an auction for such a pan-Indian GSM spectrum allocation and further this may be taken as our initial bid for the pan-India spectrum,'' Akhil Gupta, joint managing director of Bharti Group, said in a letter to the department of telecommunications.

Industry sources indicated that other GSM operators and new players in favour of auction may put in counter bids over the next few days, which could force the government to take a re-look at the option to auction spectrum instead of allocating it based on the number of subscribers.

While the communications ministry seems to be in no mood to relax the subscriber-linked spectrum allocation criteria any further, external affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee, who heads a group of ministers looking into release of spectrum, said the government expects to release extra spectrum available with the armed forces.

"No timeframe has been set... As you know there are some court cases coming up either tomorrow or very soon. This is engaging our attention and we will take a decision as soon as possible," he said on the sidelines of a function.

Bharti's move comes after all negotiations between the industry and the government over the last two months to arrive at a resolution to the spectrum allocation criteria failed.

The communications ministry had offered to accept subscriber allocation norms specified by the telecom regulator instead of the higher numbers suggested by the DoT. Bharti had rejected this as it would not result in any additional spectrum immediately for existing GSM operators.

''We are disappointed at the outcome so far where one can only conclude that there is a continuous move towards unjustifiably tightening the subscriber allocation criteria for the existing GSM operators. Considering the developments, it seems apparent that a satisfactory outcome of the process underway seems unlikely and the issue is headed for a possible lengthy litigation,'' Gupta said in the letter.

Reliance Communications, meanwhile, termed it as a ploy on the part of Bharti to prevent competition. RCom said that Bharti was confusing issues. ''This tantamount to a second GSM licence for Bharti, which is not permissible under law,'' said an RCom spokesperson.

The communication ministry had ruled out auction on the grounds that it would be unfair to the new players. GSM players such as Bharti have until now got spectrum up to 10 MHz almost free of charge and it would be illegal if the government asked the new entrants to pay for spectrum as determined through an auction. New applicants have sent legal notices to DoT asking for letter of intent for a licence.

Meanwhile, Tata Teleservices has filed a fresh petition in the Telecom Dispute Settlement Appellate Tribunal, contesting higher spectrum for GSM operators compared to CDMA operators. Tata Teleservices has also sought a direction that GSM operators should be asked to surrender spectrum beyond 6.2 MHz as CDMA operators get only 5 MHz despite paying the same entry fees.