New Delhi: On a day when the Supreme Court-mandated deadline for Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea to pay Rs 88,624 crore in past dues ended, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) decided Thursday not to take coercive action against defaulters during pendency of their appeals in the apex court for relaxations in the order.
While Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea did not pay the dues, billionaire Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio paid Rs 195 crore to clear all outstanding against it, official sources said.
Meanwhile in another development, Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said the Rs 3-lakh crore sought by the DoT from non-telecom PSUs, such as GAIL, Oil India Ltd (OIL) and PowerGrid, was a result of ‘communication gap’ as these firms are not liable to pay any dues following the Supreme Court’s October 24 ruling that non-telecom revenues of telecom firms should be included for considering payments of government dues.
OIL and GAIL, which were not a party to the litigation that led to the October 24 order, filed clarificatory applications in the Supreme Court.
Following the October 24 order, DoT had sought Rs 1.47 lakh crore from Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea and 13 other telecom companies. Iy also raised a demand of Rs 1.72 lakh crore from gas utility GAIL India Ltd, Rs 48,000 crore from Oil India Ltd, Rs 40,000 crore from PowerGrid, Rs 15,019 crore from Gujarat Narmada Valley Fertilizers and a few more demands on firms such as RailTel.
Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea, whose review petitions against the October 24 order was rejected by the Supreme Court last week, communicated to the DoT that they will not pay the dues by the deadline and will instead away for the outcome of the subsequent modification petition filed seeking relaxation in payments, they said. The petition is listed for hearing in the Supreme Court next week.
PTI