Oil India may move TDSAT against DoT’s Rs 48,000 crore demand

Other non-telecom firms, which have also been slapped with similar demands, too are likely to move the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT).

Those likely to go to the TDSAT include gas utility GAIL India Ltd, from whom Rs 1.83 lakh crore has been sought, Power Grid Corp that has been slapped with Rs 21,953.65 crore liability and Gujarat Narmada Valley Fertilizers & Chemicals Ltd which faces a payout of Rs 15,019.97 crore.

Following the Supreme Court ruling of October 24, 2019 that non-telecom revenues should be included for considering payments of the government dues by firms holding any sort of telecom license, the DoT slapped Rs 1.47 lakh crore demand on mobile phone operators such as Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea and another Rs 2.7 lakh crore from non-telecom firms.

Non-telecom firms such as OIL, GAIL and PowerGrid filed clarificatory petition on applicability of the October 24 order on them, but the apex court on February 14 asked them to approach the appropriate authority. “As per our licence condition, any dispute has to be referred to TDSAT and so we will be approaching TDSAT within a week’s time,” Mishra said here.

On February 14, the Supreme Court had pulled up the DoT for not enforcing its October 24 order that gave telcos three months’ time to pay dues. Hours later, the DoT sent notices to Airtel and Vodafone Idea asking them to clear dues immediately but hadn’t so far raised such demand with non-telecom companies, industry sources said.

OIL, the nation’s second biggest state-owned oil producer, holds a National Long Distance Service Licence (NLD) with primary objective of monitoring and operation of its pipeline network. The surplus bandwidth capacity available with the company was leased out to the telecom operators/other users, on which the company regularly paid the applicable license fee to the DoT.

But after the October 24 Supreme Court ruling for including non-telecom revenues for calculating dues, the DoT included all revenues from oil and gas to seek Rs 48,489 crore from the company for the period from 2007-08 to 2018-19. OIL believes the October 24 judgement was not applicable to the company and had represented to the DoT stating that the demand raised is not sustainable either in law or on facts as the nature of licence in case of telecom service providers is different and distinct from the licences given to the company, Mishra said.

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Vodafone Idea could be the largest bankruptcy ever in India as the inability to pay dues under the adjusted gross revenue (AGR) may push the Vodafone Plc and Aditya Birla JV in that direction. If the promoters and management of Vodafone Idea file for bankruptcy, it will be an earthquake for India Inc. But, one legal view is filing under IBC in the NCLT after the Supreme Court order will be to circumvent contempt of court. Vodafone Idea, promoted by British telecoms giant, Vodafone Plc and Aditya Birla group, has said it will repay some of its obligations under AGR in the next few days. However, it has not disclosed how much the amount will be paid. “The company is currently assessing the amount that it will be able to pay to DoT towards the dues calculated based on AGR, as interpreted by the Supreme Court in its order dated 24 October 2019. The company proposes to pay the amount so assessed in the next few days,” Vodafone said in a regulatory filing.