Tier-II and tier-III towns have a reason to rejoice.
The telecom ministry has asked mobile operators to disconnect mobile phones without the IMEI number from December 1.
The Income Tax Department has slapped a Rs 1,067-crore demand notice on telecom giant Bharti Airtel for non-payment of TDS dues in the last four financial years in connection with its overseas operations, even as the company said it was fully compliant with all the provisions.
He allegedly advanced the cut-off date to favour accused firms in allocation of 2G licences.
Capital dumping is being used by foreign e-commerce firms to subsidise and engage in predatory pricing, oil-to-telecom conglomerate Reliance Industries (RIL) has told the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (Assocham) in an internal document. The document alleges that this is leading to massive unemployment and financial distress among small merchants and kirana stores. It consists of various recommendations and proposed changes that deal with Press Note 2 of 2018 (PN 2), which RIL wanted Assocham to present to the government, according to sources.
The 21-day coronavirus lockdown in force since Wednesday has triggered a mass exodus of migrant workers across the country since the last few days.
The Congress on Friday indicated that it will not seek any action against Telecom Minister A Raja after raids on the office of Department of Telecom (DoT) in connection with alleged irregularities in allocation of 2G spectrum to new players, saying the FIR only named officials.
The operator was directed to pay the spectrum charges based on the combined GSM and CDMA spectrum allocated, which otherwise were to be charged separately, it argued.
The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is likely to reject the telecom regulator's proposal to charge operators holding excess spectrum at a rate determined on the basis of the ongoing 3G bids.
Vodafone Idea, which reported a loss of Rs 6,439 crore in the December quarter, said it had received letters from the department of telecommunications (DoT) directing immediate payment of dues amounting to Rs 54,000 crores after the SC judgment. "The company is currently assessing the amount that it will be able to pay to DoT towards the dues calculated based on AGR, as interpreted by the Supreme Court in its order dated October 24, 2019. The company proposes to pay the amount so assessed in the next few days," it stated.
The government announced a Rs 1000-crore (Rs 10-billion) project to convert wireless operations of defence services on Optical Fibre Cable, a move that is estimated to release 45 MHz of spectrum.
The department of telecommunication has decided that the existing variable licence fee structure for telecom operators should be replaced with a uniform one. An departmental note suggests a uniform licence fee of 8.5 per cent for all types of services.
The DoT is conducting a special audit on companies that have multiple licences -- mobile, international long distance, domestic long distance and internet service provider among others. Contractor, Nayak & Kishnadwala has been appointed to examine the books of Bharti Airtel, while S K Mehta & Co will check Vodafone-Essar's accounts. Varma & Varma has been appointed as auditors for Tata Teleservices, while Chhajed & Doshi will examine the books of Idea Cellular.
'The question is: Who misrepresented the facts to the then PM? It was not A Raja but Pulok Chatterjee, in consultation with T K A Nair, as he had suppressed the most relevant and controversial part of the letter of A Raja from the then Prime Minister,' says the special CBI judge in his 2G spectrum case verdict.
A bigger problem is that there is no clear definition of "call drops".
Dismantling a legacy of United Progressive Alliance rule, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has abolished all the 30 GoMs and EGoMs and told ministries and departments to take decisions on pending matters.
The sharing agreement will provide more bandwidth for RJIL to provide its high-speed 4G services.
The lobby group of CDMA mobile players like the Reliance Communications and the Tatas has accused that the government was favouring the GSM players while deciding the criteria for spectrum allocation and in its pricing.
The department, according to officials, has reportedly traced instances of tax evasion by various Telecom firms that have been named by the CBI and the ED in their charge sheets.
This comes on the heels of the department of telecom appointing private auditors to look into the books of telcos after it was detected that some of the operators were diverting revenues in segments which attracted lower licence fee.
The attendee had to call into the conference call and say a few initial pleasantries to establish his/her presence, but could then leave the app to handle the rest once the Senior Company Bore began his monologue... A rib-tickling excerpt from Sanjeev Sanyal's Life Over Two Beers.
Phones from the grey market can now land you in trouble as telecom operators have started informing subscribers that services to cellphones without a valid international mobile equipment identity number will soon be disconnected.
Idea may have to shell out Rs 4,500 crore in cash
The move is significant as it would extend the power of CAG -- set up to audit central and state government departments as well as PSUs -- to private sector companies.
As per the initial version of the Unified Licence on August 2, DoT had exempted Internet services revenue from adjusted gross revenue -- part of telecom company's earnings on which annual licence fee is levied.
Airtel, Vodafone, Idea, RCom, Reliance Jiosubmitted applications.
Earlier, only access to white-listed sites was allowed as the service was restored for a week on January 25 and subsequently extended from time to time, after being snapped on August 5 last year when the Centre abrogated the special status to the erstwhile state and bifurcated it into two union territories.
The companies have offered to pay upfront the principal amount due for licence fees and spectrum usage charges (SUCs) on the basis of adjusted gross revenue (AGR). This amount will not include the interest, the penalty, and the interest on the penalty.
A Central Bureau of Investigation officer, who was part of the probe team investigating the 2G spectrum scam, on Thursday denied in a Delhi court that A Raja's erstwhile private secretary R K Chandolia was falsely implicated in the case as he had refused to depose against the former telecom minister.
During the first six months (up to the second quarter of the current fiscal) of 2009-10, the department of telecommunication has already collected Rs 4,112.30 crore (Rs 41.12 billion), minister of state for telecom and IT Gurudas Kamat said in a written reply to the Lok Sabha.
There was an under reporting of Rs 1000 crore (Rs 10 billion) to Rs 1500 crore (Rs 15 billion) by the telecom firms, to avoid payment of licence fee, and the government may have lost about Rs 250 crore (Rs 2.5 billion) because of this, telecom minister A Raja said during Question Hour.
The government on Saturday made its prior approval mandatory for foreign investments from countries that share land border with India to curb 'opportunistic takeovers' of domestic firms following the COVID-19 pandemic, a move which will restrict Foreign Direct Investment from China.
Spectrum trading will happen in 9 circles.
Telecom Secretary J S Deepak has resolved the toughest issues facing the sector, but his real test will be in delivering on the govt's Digital India dream
The move gains importance after two new telecom players -- Swan and Unitech -- sold stakes to foreign companies at high premiums after the allocation of spectrum. The Left parties had also accused Telecom Minister A Raja of underselling spectrum that cost the national exchequer around Rs 60,000 crore (Rs 600 billion).
Reliance Infocomm violated the licence conditions by evading levy through illegally routing international calls as local ones, the government on Monday told the telecom tribunal.
Government expects to fetch at least Rs 64,840 crore
