New Delhi: The Supreme Court clarified Thursday that its October 2019 judgement directing telecom companies to pay dues in view of the new meaning attributed to Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) did not intend to cover the Public Sector Undertakings (PSU).
A three-judge bench led by Justice Arun Mishra asked the Department of Telecom (DoT) to reconsider demanding AGR from the PSUs.
“Our judgement could not have the basis for demands on PSUs”, the bench observed.
The court, which held a virtual hearing of the matter, also directed telecom companies to file affidavits on how they propose to make payment of their liabilities towards AGR dues.
The bench on 18 March came down heavily on the department for allowing the companies to self-assess their dues.
“We will not allow self-assessment of dues by telecoms and won’t hear any further objections,” it had said in scathing remarks against the DoT, which moved an application seeking reasonable time for the telecom firms to pay.
The DoT’s application sought the court’s permission to allow telecom companies to pay AGR dues worth Rs 1.43 lakh crore over a period of 20 years.
On Thursday, the court sought to know the mode of payment telecom companies propose to adopt, and also the guarantees and sureties to be furnished by them against the dues.
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‘If all dues are paid at one go, it may disrupt services’
Pressing the DoT’s application, solicitor general Tushar Mehta told the court the Centre had examined the possible impact of recovering all dues from the companies in one go.
“If all telecom dues are paid at one go, then it might disrupt telecom services if some operator shuts operations,” Mehta submitted before the bench, which asked him to let it know a time-frame within which dues can be recovered.
Mehta explained the proposition to give a reasonable window of 20 years, when the court questioned the rationale behind the DoT’s proposal. The solicitor said it was done after authorities concerned considered a number of factors.
Several Senior counsels, appearing for various telecom operators, sought time to reply on the issue.
Vodafone-Idea claimed that on account of the company’s “tight-financial condition” it would not be able to furnish a bank guarantee. Aircel told the court that a resolution process under Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) was pending against the company.
The court will now hear the telecom companies on 18 June.
Our judgment has been used and misused: Court
The bench was critical of the DoT’s approach to rope in the PSUs even though the October 2019 judgement was silent on them. It told Mehta to withdraw the demand raised against the PSUs.
“Every day I think about how our judgement has been used and misused,” remarked the bench when it was informed that an amount of Rs 4 lakh crore was raised against the PSUs on account of AGR dues.
Mehta said the demand was raised because the PSUs are also licence-holders.
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This is blatant politics by the Supreme Court. Don’t the same laws apply to everybody? Instead, they want to destroy private companies while preserving inefficient and corrupt public companies. This is yet another example of the arrogance and dishonesty of our self-appointed judiciary.
With due respect to the Hon’ble Bench, there is inherent contradiction in forcing the private sector telecom players to pay the dues, while PSUs would be exempted from the payment. I would humbly request that this matter be referred to a higher bench as insistence on payment of dues worked out to the tune of thousands of crores of rupees can totally damage the telecom industry. Consequently, the telecom sector would be reduced to a one-player industry. This matter needs a thorough re-examination.