The Competition Commission of India (CCI) is examining whether companies like Tata Communications and Bharti Airtel have adopted monopolistic business practices in cable landing station market.
India is connected to the rest of the world by 12 submarine cable systems which land at different locations. About 85 per cent of these stations are owned by Tata Communications and Bharti Airtel. The CCI is considering whether the two players have charged their clients a higher fee than the global rates.
The CCI has taken up the issue, following complaints made by few of the foreign long-distance telephony players. The foreign players allege that the Indian telecom firms are taking advantage of the control over landing stations by charging a higher landing fee.
According to foreign companies, a long-distance carrier connecting to a cable landing station in Changi, Singapore, pays less than $3,875 per annum for 10 Gbps bandwidth while in India the two operators charge anywhere between $65,000 and $2,50,000 per annum for the same bandwidth.
However, Indian telecom operators state that the higher fees are based on higher costs of setting-up and operating the cable landing stations.
