The Hindu Business Line : TRAI seeks more powers to resolve interconnect rows

THE Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) said on Thursday that it will approach either the Supreme Court or the Government to amend the TRAI Act to get more powers to intervene in disputes relating to interconnection.

Mr Pardip Baijal, Chairman, TRAI, said, "Due to an order by the Telecom Dispute Settlement Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT), TRAI has no policing powers over disputes for which the telecom tribunal is currently the sole authority. We are trying to deal with the situation to get a remedy. Either we will request that due amendment be made to the law or we will go to the Supreme Court that in interconnection, general ruling is not applicable."

Mr Baijal's comments comes in the wake of recent allegations by the CPI(M) that TRAI had not intervened in the case involving Reliance Infocomm routing international long distance calls illegally. The left party had demanded that Mr Baijal be sacked

Speaking on the sidelines of a broadband seminar, Mr Baijal said, "There is a general impression that when disputes arise, we don't act enough. But as the law stands today, TRAI cannot help in the interconnection space. It is a question of statute."

TRAI has also made a recommendation to the Government to give it financial independence by allowing it to use a small part of the licence fee collected from the operators to fund its operations, instead of the existing support from the Consolidated Fund of India.

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