Comments
In a relief to debt-laden Reliance Communications (RCom), the Supreme Court on Friday directed the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) to approve the former’s plans to sell spectrum to Reliance Jio Infocomm (RJio) within two days. The move will help RCom, a company controlled by billionaire Anil Ambani, to complete its asset sale plans and reduce debt to about ₹25,000 crore.
RCom requires a non-objection certificate from DoT to complete its proposed spectrum sale plans. At the hearing on Friday, DoT undertook to comply with the order by Monday, lawyers briefed on the matter said.
On November 30, the Supreme Court had ordered DoT to provide an NOC within seven days. Separately, the apex court has also asked RCom to furnish corporate guarantees of ₹1,400 crore within two days.
The beleaguered telecom player had submitted the guarantee through its wholly-owned subsidiary Reliance Realty.
Earlier this week, RCom moved a contempt petition against DoT for not clearing its spectrum sale and accused the licensor of not following the apex court’s direction. The case came up for hearing today.
RCom had also moved DoT seeking approvals to sell off its remaining spectrum in the 850 MHz band, again to RJio, which is expected to fetch another ₹3,700 crore. At present, RCom’s debt stands at about ₹42,000 crore, of which it owes about ₹20,000 crore to a clutch of lenders led by State Bank of India.
Payment to Ericsson
On Thursday, the Supreme Court refused to entertain RCom’s request for an extension to settle a ₹550-crore debt it owes to Swedish telecom equipment-maker Ericsson. The deadline for the payment, which was extended once earlier, now ends on December 15.
RCom Chairman Anil Ambani had also given a personal guarantee to the court to settle the dues by December 15. RCom now intends to settle the dues during this weekend. Any delay in payment will attract an interest of 12 per cent. In October, Ericsson filed a contempt of court petition before the Supreme Court against RCom, after the latter failed to settle the dues before a September 30 deadline. Later,, RCom moved the Supreme Court, requesting a 60-day extension to pay.
Comments
COMMENT NOW
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.