Cases of equipment thefts at all-time high; COAI seeks DoT's intervention

Industry body COAI on Friday sought the government's intervention on the issue of rising cases of telecom equipment theft and said telcos are incurring huge losses and expenses in replenishing equipment at affected sites, and even customers are suffering.

The Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), which counts operators like Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea as its members, wrote to telecom secretary Neeraj Mittal, flagging the issue.

The association has urged the Department of Telecom (DoT) to write to all State Chief Secretaries to prioritise such complaints and ensure strict action on the same.

COAI also urged the DoT to issue orders for the immediate blocking of several foreign websites (including eBay, Alibaba, Telefly, Seeker816, Dorfatrade) that are "selling active equipment" suspected to have been stolen from networks of member telcos.

"It is...critical that these websites are blocked immediately," COAI said.

COAI requested the DoT to urgently intervene in the issue of equipment theft cases, and to "write to all State Chief Secretaries to prioritise such complaints and ensure strict action on the same".

It has also suggested to the DoT to coordinate with states for police protection for telecom infrastructure, especially in theft-prone areas as also to issue orders for blocking certain websites selling active equipment.

"This is to bring to your kind attention a very serious issue being faced by our member TSPs (telecom service providers) across multiple circles the incidents of theft of active equipment are at an all-time high...from October 2023 onwards, such incidents have increased multi-fold," COAI director general SP Kochhar said in the letter dated March 14.

RRU (Remote Radio Unit) and BBU (Baseband Unit) are the main equipment being stolen.

The association also highlighted that instances of theft are disproportionately higher in a few specific geographies of Delhi NCR, Rajasthan, Assam, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Punjab and Haryana.

Just 31 districts account for 50 per cent of the theft incidents reported pan India. Also, it said there are a huge number of sites which have seen repeated instances of equipment theft.

"With the rising incidents of theft, customers are the ones suffering the most. While these incidents almost always lead to a decline in the quality of services to the customers being served by the site, there may also be instances where services cease completely," COAI said in the letter.

Considering the large scale at which these incidents are occurring now, telcos are incurring huge losses as well as additional expenditure in replenishing the equipment, the telecom body said.

COAI noted that the government has already recognised the seriousness of such an offence and classified the same as a cognisable and non-bailable offence under the Telecommunications Act, 2023.