CII asks govt to lower telecom levies

CII today urged the government to lower levies on the telecom sector to 13 per cent from existing 34 per cent in a phased manner to make the services more affordable, especially in the rural areas.

At a meeting with the Minister for Communications and Information Technology, A Raja, the industry chamber submitted a five-point agenda on telecom and broadband growth and said that taxes and levies in the sector should be reduced in two phases.

To begin with, it said, the levies should be brought down to 22 per cent and then to 13-15 per cent in the second phase.

"Rationalisation of taxation and levies is must for affordable tele services as the taxes and levies paid by the Indian telecom sector in the form of licence fee, spectrum charges and service tax are the highest compared to other Asian economies," CII said.

For the growth of telecom and broadband, CII said the government must provide autonomy to USO Fund (a corpus used for offering services in rural areas) administrator to develop telecom infrastructure.

The five-point agenda included roadmap for accelerating inclusive, equitable and sustainable growth of broadband in India to reach 695 million users by 2014.