'It's just that the process is taking a longer time but I have no reason to believe there are any hiccups,' said Mahesh Uppal, director of telecom consulting firm Com First.

Singapore Telecom, a major existing shareholder of Bharti, will continue to be a strategic partner and hold significant stake after the implementation of the potential transaction.

Bharti had ended talks with MTN last year, rejecting the proposal that would have made the Indian firm a subsidiary of MTN. Following that, the South African group started negotiations with the Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group, which also failed.

However, Bharti and MTN started negotiations again May 25 this year to forge an alliance that would make it the biggest deal ever in the industry.

Earlier this month, the market regulator had permitted Airtel and MTN to go ahead with their proposal to buy each other's shares in a $23-billion deal without the latter having to make an open offer in Indian equities markets.

Both Bharti and MTN have over 100 million subscribers and the deal will make the combined entity among the top five telecom service companies in the world, with annual revenues of $20 billion.