1, ఫిబ్రవరి 2012, బుధవారం

Telecom Services Industry in Troubles—Tariffs may be hiked


The telecom services industry in India is not in a good shape. The total debt of the private telecom operators (BSNL has no debt burden so far) is Rs 2,75,000 crores. For the 3G and BWA spectrum all the telecom services companies including the PSUs have paid Rs 1,05,000 crores in 2010. 

Except the top 3 companies—Airtel, Vodafone and Idea—all other telecom companies are losing Rs 800 to 1000 crore every three months, due to this debt burden, heavy investment and steep fall in tariffs. The ARPU(Aveerage Revenue Per User) in case of GSM subscriber came down from Rs 261 in December 2007 to Rs 100 in March 2011. The ARPU of CDMA subscriber came down from Rs 176 in December 2007 to Rs 66 in March 2011. Added to this, the Goveernment is planning to collect the amount for the additional spectrum beyond 6.2 MHz in case of GSM operators and 4.4 MHz in case of CDMA operators retrospectively. If paid, this will be around Rs 17000 crore. The DoT already issued notices to 5 telecom companies—airtel, vodaafone, idea, Rcom and TTTSL asking them to pay Rs 1600 crore( all 5 together) towards the license fee and spectrum charge evaded by them by undershowing their revenue during the years 2007-07 and 2007-08. 

In view of this situation where most of the telcos are facing debt burden, and losses or marginal profits and penalties from DoT, it is reported in the news papers that the mobile tariffs are likely to be increased from 60 paise per minute to 72 paise and STD and calls to landline fro 60 paise to 90 paise per minute.  

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