New Delhi: After the Supreme Court rebuke, the Department of Telecommunications has issued orders to telecom companies like Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea to pay the statutory dues before midnight on Friday.
The Supreme Court pulled up the department for prohibiting collection of dues from telecom companies. After that, the Department of Telecommunications has started sending notices to companies regarding dues on a circle basis. Uttar Pradesh (West) Telecom Circle issued notice to all telecom service providers on Friday asking them to pay the dues by 11.59 on Friday.
It states, “… you are directed to pay the outstanding amount in lieu of license fee and spectrum usage fee before 14.5.2020 at 11.59 pm”. A telecom operator on condition of anonymity Accepted to receive notice.
However, it is not yet clear how much of the outstanding amount has been asked to be paid till midnight. All the 15 units owed Rs 92,642 crore as license fee and Rs 55,054 crore as spectrum usage charges. That is, the government owes Rs 1.47 lakh crore on these companies. These orders have been issued by the Controller of Communication Accounts of the Circle.
Earlier, the Department of Telecom withdrew the order which forbade any punitive action against defaulting telecom companies. The Supreme Court took a strong stand on Friday for not complying with its order, soon after which the department took this step.
