Telecom companies such as Airtel, Voda-Idea still await the verdict on the AGR payment timeline

SC AGR Hearing LIVE: The Supreme Court continues hearing on adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues of telecom companies and past dues of insolvent firms for the fourth straight day today. A bench comprising Justices Arun Mishra, S Abdul Nazeer and MR Shah is hearing the matter. Earlier, on Wednesday, the SC questioned how spectrum can be sold by insolvent telecom operators such as Reliance Communications (RCom) and Aircel when it doesn’t belong to them. Senior advocate Harish Salve, appearing for Reliance Jio, told the bench that spectrum is not owned by the telcos and belongs to the government, but under the contractual arrangement, the telecom operators have the right to use it and pay the usage charges to the government. Salve also argued that if the sale of spectrum is not allowed, then Reliance Communication will go into liquidation and it won’t help anyone. While Rcom has AGR dues worth Rs 25,000 crore, Aircel’s is around Rs 12,389 crore. SC has observed that the AGR dues of insolvent companies amount to Rs 45,000 crore.

Telecom companies such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea and Tata Teleservices (Maharashtra) still await the verdict on the AGR payment timeline. Airtel and Vodafone Idea have demanded a 15-year payment window while Tata Teleservices sought for 7-10 years. So far, Bharti Airtel has paid nearly Rs 18,000 crore and Vodafone Idea has paid a total of Rs 7,854 crore to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) towards the AGR dues.