The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has asked the Supreme Court to take over the various petitions related to the payment of one-time spectrum charges by the operators. To this end, DoT has submitted a plea in the Supreme Court to move the cases from different high courts and tribunals to the apex court citing that the various service providers have opted for a delaying tactic to avoid paying charges to the telecom department.
DoT had issued two orders in December 2012 and March 2013, asking the various telecom companies to pay a one-time spectrum charge for holding additional spectrum above 4.4 MHz (GSM) and above 2.5 MHz (CDMA). The charge is based on market determined price decided in the auctions. Consequently, the telecom department levied one-time spectrum charges aggregating to Rs 261.95 billion on various telecom companies. The amount includes a sum of Rs 24.18 billion for CDMA operators, Rs 130.60 billion for GSM operators and Rs 101.17 billion on the public sector operators.
DoT had issued a demand notice of Rs 11.52 billion to Tata Teleservices Limited, Rs 52.01 billion to Bharti Airtel, Rs 35.99 billion to Vodafone, Rs 18.82 billion to Idea Cellular, Rs 13.51 billion to Aircel and Rs 11.57 billion to Reliance Communications. Besides, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited has been asked to pay Rs 69.11 billion, while Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited is required to pay Rs 33.13 billion.
Subsequently, Bharti Airtel, Idea and Tata Teleservices (Maharashtra) Limited approached the Bombay High Court; Aircel and Dishnet Wireless moved to the Madras High Court and Tata Teleservices Limited and Reliance Communication and its susbdiary Reliance Telecom approached the Calcutta High Court.
