The row over Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) is far from over as Bharti Airtel Ltd has approached the Supreme Court over "arithmetical errors," in the Department of Telecommunications’ (DoT) calculation of their AGR dues.
Telecom firm Vodafone Idea Ltd is likely to follow suit soon.
The company, in its petition, asked the top court to reduce AGR dues payable to the government and pleaded for recalling of its earlier order in this regard.
Airtel contended that though the company cleared some AGR dues, it was not factored in the demand raised by the DOT in different circle and years.
The petition also claimed that the DoT applied incorrect interest rate to raise demands for Spectrum Usage Charge (SUC), duplication in revenue addition by adding it twice from different audit reports.
A three-judge apex court bench, headed by Justice Arun Mishra in September last year, directed telecom firms to make 10% upfront payment of their AGR dues, with the 10-year payment schedule to begin on April 1, 2021. The court ordered the annual instalments to be paid by February 7 every year.
While the court had upheld the Telecom department definition of AGR, it also rejected the telecom firms argument that their self-assessment dues are less than its demands.
The DoT has miscomputed by including spectrum usage charges (SUC) into total dues of Rs 43,959 crore, it said.
The telecom major also claimed that the issue before the SC on account of AGR dues was limited to licence fee only and not the SUC.
As per DoT calculation, Airtel has to pay a total of Rs 43,980 crore in AGR dues including principal, interest, penalty and interest on the penalty. The company has already paid Rs 18,004 crore.
However, the telecom firm's self-assessment dues to the government Rs 13,004 crore.
According to the DoT, Vodafone's AGR dues was at Rs 58,400 crore but the company had paid Rs. 7,854 crore.
(Published 06 January 2021, 15:19 IST)
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