Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Thursday, Mar 06, 2008
ePaper | Mobile/PDA Version
Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Thursday, Mar 06, 2008 ePaper | Mobile/PDA Version |
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Info-Tech
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Telecommunications Industry & Economy - Rural Development
Thomas K Thomas New Delhi, March 5 The Department of Telecom has asked Reliance Communication to pay liquidated damages for missing out on the targets for rolling out Rural Community Phones under the Universal Services Obligation fund. As per the agreement between DoT and RCom, 21,431 phones were supposed to be set up by September 2007. Reliance has, however, rolled out 16,248 phones. While the company met its targets in the first two years, it fell way short of the committed number in the third year of implementation. Out of 8,573 community phones supposed to be set up in the third year RCom could manage only 1,321 phones. “The agreements entered between USOF and RCom provide for levying of liquidated damages in case of delay in provisioning of Rural Community Phones beyond the stipulated time. The damages are being levied wherever applicable as per the terms and conditions of agreements,” said a DoT official. CDMA industry sources said that the delay by RCom was caused as DoT had changed some part of the project after the agreement was signed. For instance, it was told to the company that only the first PCO (across all operators) installed in a village would be applicable for the USO subsidy. The company had to undertake a time-consuming verification exercise to determine which of the pre-agreed villages already had a rural community phone and would not come under the purview of the contract. They said that in a few areas, services could not be provisioned due to non-feasibility of point-of-interconnection for fixed lines. When contacted, an RCom spokesperson said, “Bridging the urban–rural digital divide has been an integral part of oure vision . Over the last two years, Reliance Communications has installed 3 lakh Rural PCOs to over 10 crore rural population in India. The company plans to cover over 6 lakh Indian villages under its wireless network by end of March 2008.” More Stories on : Telecommunications | Rural Development | Regulatory Bodies & Rulings | Reliance Communications Ltd
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