Tamil Nadu cadre IAS officer K Rajaraman on Friday took charge as the new telecom secretary. His joining comes following the superannuation of Anshu Prakash on September 30. "Shri K Rajaraman, IAS (TN:89) takes charge as Secretary, @DoT_India in presence of senior officials of the department," a PIB tweet said. He was serving as the additional secretary for investments at the Department of Economic Affairs before being promoted to the position of secretary, DoT.
The announcement quells fears among some telcos that Chinese players might be banned from participating in 5G trials and roll outs.
Analysts believe making mobile data more affordable will fuel mass market adoption of data services
Reliance Jio has accused old operators, including Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea, of "illegally" masquerading wire-line numbers as mobile numbers for "undue enrichment".
L&T was the top gainer in the Sensex pack followed by M&M, SBI, Titan, Infosys, Bharti Airtel and Ultratech Cement.
IndusInd Bank was the top laggard in the Sensex pack, falling over 5 per cent, followed by HDFC, Axis Bank, PowerGrid, SBI, Bajaj Finserv and Bharti Airtel.
Idea, Reliance and BSNL have call drop rates in the range of 10 per cent or above.
Indian telecom operators have surpassed the three- year 5G network rollout target given to them within six months and now the government is making efforts to enhance adoption of 5G applications across various key segments, a senior government official said in Barcelona. Department of Telecom Additional Secretary VL Kantha Rao told PTI at "India Evening" event on the sidelines of Mobile World Congress 2023 that the government has hosted over 50 companies at the India pavilion and the delegation is here to showcase indigenously-developed 4G and 5G technology stack. "When the spectrum was allocated to telecom service providers for 5G rollout, we gave a minimum rollout obligation saying that within one year they have to cover a few cities within three years, a few towns and so on and so forth.
Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad had told Parliament in November that Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea and other telecom companies owe the government as much as Rs 1.47 lakh crore in past statutory dues.
Bharti Airtel was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rising around 3 per cent, followed by HUL, HDFC, ITC, IndusInd Bank, SBI, Sun Pharma, ONGC, Tech Mahindra, L&T and Asian Paints. On the other hand, Kotak Bank, Nestle India, Tata Steel, Bajaj Finance and HDFC Bank were among the laggards.
The market valuation of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) jumped Rs 31,294.89 crore to Rs 8,25,149.40 crore while Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) added Rs 28,464.11 crore to take its market valuation to Rs 11,33,168.55 crore.
The Cabinet approved giving Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea Ltd and Reliance Jio an option to avail of a two-year moratorium on payments they were supposed to make in yearly installments for the spectrum bought in auctions.
Bajaj Finance was the top loser, tumbling 4.68 per cent, followed by Tech Mahindra, IndusInd Bank, ICICI Bank, SBI, Reliance Industries, Bharti Airtel and HCL Tech. NSE Nifty crashed 290.70 points or 2.43 per cent to 11,680.35.
The market capitalisation of the BSE-listed companies reached an all-time high of Rs 220.74 lakh crore on Thursday, helped by a bullish sentiment in the equity market. At the close of trade, their market capitalisation stood at Rs 2,20,74,421.11 crore. The 30-share BSE benchmark closed 97.70 points, or 0.19 per cent, higher at 51,115.22 on Thursday.
Jio's global partnerships took shape this year when Jio Platforms, a 100 per cent subsidiary of Reliance Jio which has invested in various digital platforms, was able to woo a bevy of marquee investors: Facebook, Google, Qualcomm, Intel, and a numerous PE funds.
According to telcos and analysts, this is due to SIM consolidation happening after the minimum recharge plans were implemented by incumbents.
HDFC was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, surging over 5 per cent, followed by M&M, L&T, Tata Steel, Bajaj Finance, HDFC Bank and Sun Pharma. On the other hand, IndusInd Bank, Hero MotoCorp, Bharti Airtel and Asian Paints finished in the red.
Jio says it has completed mobile number portability testing and is certified MNP-compliant
M&M was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rallying around 6 per cent, followed by SBI, ITC, NTPC, Bharti Airtel and ONGC. On the other hand, Bajaj Finance, HDFC, Bajaj Finserv, Titan, Sun Pharma and Dr Reddy's were among the laggards. NSE Nifty inched up 1.40 points to its fresh closing record of 14,564.85.
The Sensex rally was driven by Tata Motors, Vedanta, Bharti Airtel, Maruti, Reliance Industries, Tata Steel, Larsen and Toubro and HCL Tech.
Late selling in blue-chips like Reliance Industries, ITC, Infosys, TCS and Bharti Airtel dragged down the index from the record level to close flat.
A rare bonhomie among three private telecom companies in raising tariffs coming on the back of a bailout package by the government may have helped the telecom sector avert a crisis but the challenges haven't ceased to exist as the industry faces a cash-guzzling task of rolling out 5G networks in the coming months. The sector that provides direct and indirect employment to millions is projected to see Rs 1.3 lakh crore to Rs 2.3 lakh crore of investments in the coming years in creating robust infrastructure and building telecom and network products that have been incentivised by the government through PLI and other initiatives. After years of cut-throat competition and the apex court ruling on payment of past statutory dues left some players in the lurch, billionaire Sunil Mittal's Bharti Airtel and struggling Vodafone Idea almost in tandem raised tariffs, taking the plunge they had long been talking about.
After a turnaround in performance by Indian equity markets since July that has seen the S&P BSE Sensex and the Nifty50 wipe out the year-to-date losses, analysts suggest investors start nibbling into stocks that are focused on the domestic economy. While they say intermittent corrections, led by policies of global central banks and other economic data, cannot be ruled out, analysts expect India's relative outperformance among global equity markets to continue as it looks better placed with a healthy economic recovery, and remains one of the fastest growing major economies. In this backdrop, Neeraj Chadawar, head of quantitative equity strategy at Axis Securities, believes that amid global slowdown, aggressive tightening by the central banks, and preference for domestic interests first (by the local government), export-oriented themes are likely to be muted or will deliver conservative returns in the near-term.
Equity markets halted their two-day rally on Friday, with the Sensex tumbling 714.53 points amid weak global equities and selling in index majors Infosys, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and Reliance Industries. Continuous foreign fund outflows also dented sentiments. The BSE benchmark Sensex tanked 714.53 points or 1.23 per cent to settle at 57,197.15. During the day, it plummeted 776.96 points or 1.34 per cent to 57,134.72. The NSE Nifty also declined 220.65 points or 1.27 per cent to 17,171.95.
IndusInd Bank, ITC, HDFC Bank, Tata Steel, HDFC, ICICI Bank and Reliance Industries are also among top gainers. SE Nifty jumped 52.35 points to finish at 11,322.50.
Commercial 5G services will be rolled out in 13 cities in India, including the metropolises, in 2022, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) said in a statement on Monday. These cities are Delhi, Gurugram, Mumbai, Pune, Chennai, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Lucknow, Ahmedabad, Gandhinagar, and Jamnagar. "These metros and big cities would be the first places for the launch of 5G services in the country next year," the DoT said.
M&M was the top loser in the Sensex pack, shedding over 2 per cent, followed by Dr Reddy's Bharti Airtel, Tech Mahindra, HUL, ICICI Bank and Infosys. NSE Nifty dropped 64.80 points to 14,341.35.
Debt-ridden telecom operator Vodafone Idea has decided to defer payment of additional adjusted gross revenues of Rs 8,837 crore dues by a period of four years. The company in a late night filing on June 22, said that the DoT on June 15, has raised adjusted gross revenue (AGR) demand for additional two financial years beyond 2016-17, which were not covered under the Supreme court order on the statutory dues. Vodafone Idea (VIL) in the filing said that its board of directors "has approved the exercise of the option of deferment of the AGR related dues by a period of four years with immediate effect, in accordance with the said DoT Letter.
Of the two big players, while Bharti Airtel can leverage its existing subscriber base, newcomer Reliance Jio will have to wean away subscribers from the incumbents
BSNL, Tata Teleservices and Reliance Communications, who also provide GSM technology-based services, are not part of the report.
The Sunil Mittal led firm accused the regulator of "wrongly" holding Jio's promotional offer as compliant with the regulatory guidelines
To help 2G customers who have to buy a new phone to upgrade to 4G, the company had earlier introduced 4G feature phones, to make it affordable for them to make the switch.
ONGC was the top loser in the Sensex pack, slumping over 4 per cent, followed by NTPC, Kotak Bank, Titan, Bharti Airtel and PowerGrid. On the other hand, IndusInd Bank rallied over 6 per cent.
M&M was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, soaring over 10 per cent, followed by L&T, IndusInd Bank, Bajaj Finserv, SBI, Bajaj Finance, ICICI Bank and Kotak Bank. On the other hand, HUL, ITC, Titan TCS and Bharti Airtel were among the losers.
Bharti Airtel has paid Rs 11,374.7 cr while upfront amount due from it was Rs 7,832.20 cr
Axis Bank was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, climbing 3.33 per cent, followed by PowerGrid, SBI, Bharti Airtel, ICICI Bank, Reliance Industries and Maruti.
Investors' wealth rose by Rs 2,22,763.25 crore in three days of market rally, with the benchmark Sensex closing at an all-time high on Thursday. At close of trade, the 30-share BSE index gained 254.80 points or 0.48 per cent to 53,158.85, its lifetime closing high. During the day, the benchmark also reached its all-time intra-day peak of 53,266.12 points. The benchmark has gained 786.16 points in three days.
Jio has accused incumbent telecom operators for not providing the required number of equipment to connect its mobile network with theirs
Jio is in a neck and neck battle with Airtel, which added a similar number of subscribers as Jio in the 15 months from February 2017 to April 2018
Experts say going ahead data price will fall further due to competition
