MUMBAI, Oct 6 (Reuters) - India's telecoms spectrum auctionended on Thursday, raising the government 657.89 billion rupees($9.86 billion), Telecoms Minister Manoj Sinha said.
The minister told reporters the government expected to getabout 320 billion rupees of the spectrum payments initially ascarriers are allowed to pay in installments.
The government exceeded its budget estimates of 645.81billion rupees from the spectrum auction.
However, the auction proceeds were far below the total valueof the spectrum pegged at 5.6 trillion rupees as less than halfof the spectrum found takers. ($1 = 66.7489 Indian rupees) (Reporting by Rupam Jain; Editing by Alexandra Hudson)