Licence fee dues of tele services firms at Rs 833 cr

The government on Wednesday said that the outstanding licence fee of private telecom companies was Rs 833.64 crore, as on May 2004.

Minister of State for Communications and Information Technology, Shakeel Ahmad told Lok Sabha in a written reply that Koshika Telecom had the highest arrears at Rs 453.6 crore.

The minister stated that licence fee dues from Koshika Telecom were cumulative from 1999, while that of Spice Telecom had run up a due of Rs 4.2 crore in the current year.

The Minister said that the dues of Reliance Telecom, which stood at Rs 3.77 crore since, 2003, were being recovered out of the credits available with the Department of Telecom. These figures exclude interest and penalty payable by the companies up to the date of realisation.

The list of companies with licence fee dues was dominated by radio paging industry, which accounted for about 44 per cent of the total dues amounting to Rs 366.27 crore.

Ahmad said the government will take steps like invocation of bank guarantees and arbitration proceedings for realisation of the outstanding license fees. He also said that if these measures failed, the government might resort to cancellation of licenses after following the steps prescribed in the license agreement.

According to the details tabled by the ministry, there were a total of 35 companies who had pending dues. Out of these, 14 companies have dues accumulating since 1997.

After Koshika Telecom, Punwire Mobile Communications had the , largest pending dues at Rs 144.86 crore dues, while Punwire Paging Services' outstandings are at Rs 50.9 crore. Next came India Paging Services had outstanding licence fees of Rs 73.95 crore, since 1997.

  

Tele bill

• Koshika Telecom had the highest arrears at Rs 453.6 crore.
  
• Spice Telecom had run up a due of Rs 4.2 crore in the current year.
  
• The dues of Reliance Telecom, which stood at Rs 3.77 crore are being recovered.
  
• The list of companies with licence fee dues was dominated by radio paging industry, which accounted for about 44 per cent of the total dues amounting to Rs 366.27 crore.