The Hindu Business Line : DoT directed to pay interest to cell cos

THE Supreme Court has directed the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) to refund the interest on licence fees collected from Birla AT&T, BPL Mobile, Escotel and Fascel following their migration from the licence fee system to the revenue-sharing regime.

Upholding an earlier order by the Telecom Dispute Settlement Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT), a Bench comprising Mr Justice S. Rajendra Babu and Mr Justice A.R. Lakshmanan has told the DoT to pay five per cent interest on licence fee for a six-month period as the date for implementation of the migration package for telecom companies was extended by six months in 2000.

The apex court rejected the contention of the Government questioning the jurisdiction of the tribunal to pass such a direction, which also stated that it amounted to rewriting the contracts between cellular operators and the DoT.

The tribunal had held that the Government had not issued any order nor did the migration package contain any clause whereby the amount of outstanding licence fee payable had been reduced and the outstanding interest amount had been retained intact.

``After the migration package was evolved and announced, the liability to pay licence fee stands modified. There is no specific provision to the effect that interest will not consequentially be reduced,'' it had said.

Birla AT&T has merged with Tata Cellular to become Idea Cellular, while Fascel has been acquired by Hutchison India.

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