SC Order On AGR To Decide DoT Stance On PSU Dues

The Supreme Court order to be delivered in response to review petitions filed by private telecom companies is expected to influence the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) stance on the Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) issue with regard to non-telecom public sector units (PSUs) like Gas Authority of India Ltd (GAIL) and PowerGrid Corporation, among others.

The Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea have filed review petitions before the Supreme Court on the AGR issue, but non-telecom PSUs which collectively have to pay over Rs 2 lakh crore as AGR dues as a result of the October 24, 2019 SC order have not filed any review plea yet.

However, these PSUs have written to the DoT that they do not owe any dues to the government, since their core operations are not telecom-related but they have telecom licenses merely to facilitate part of their operations.

GAIL has written to DoT has taken into account the company’s entire revenues while calculating its AGR dues instead of taking only optical fibre-related revenues. Though the DoT has agreed to look into its representations, going by the SC order, it can do little.

PowerGrid, which has both a national long distance as well as an Internet Service Provider license has stated that it has paid whatever is due as per its license condition and owes nothing more to the government.