Datacom, Unitech move HC

Videocon-owned Datacom and realty firm Unitech today approached the Delhi High Court seeking vacation of its order which would affect their priority in getting radio frequency waves.

The court on February 13, while hearing Parsvnath's petition, had ordered that seniority of the petitioner would be not be affected if it proved that the Centre's action was illegal in rejecting its application for Unified Access Service Licence on the ground that the company's main objective did not include telecom as its business.

It further said that anything done by the Centre with those persons who had applied for grant of UASL made after the petitioner (Parsvnath) would be subject to the final outcome of the petition.

Unitech had got eight licences and Datacom got one on applications made after Parsvnath's.

The counsel for Unitech and Datacom submitted before the court that the order should be vacated as it affected the seniority of the two companies and the order was passed without giving them an opportunity to be heard.

The counsel further contended that the order negated the seniority of both applicants in terms of the Department of Telecom (DoT) press release dated January 10 which says that seniority would be counted from the date of compliance of terms of LoI and not from the date of applications made in respect of grant of LoI as was interpreted by Parsvnath.

The application said Parsvnath played a fraud on this court by first deliberately suppressing the DoT press release of January 10 and then made a patently false statement that determination of seniority for grant of spectrum was based on the date of application for grant of LoI.

The application further said that Parsvnath did not challenge the validity of the DoT press release of January 10 which postulates that the priority for grant of UASL was to be reckoned from the date of compliance with terms of LoIs.

However, the court declined to pass any order and posted the matter for hearing on April 28 but allowed Unitech and Datacom to be impleaded as party to the case.