BWA winners pay spectrum fees, BSNL seeks time

The winners of the BWA auction, including pan-India BWA licence-winner Infotel, which was acquired by Reliance Industries, made the winning bid amount to the government, while Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) sought more time.

The players who paid the winning bid amount also include Bharti Airtel, Qualcomm, MTNL and Aircel. MTNL raised the money by taking loan from three banks.

However, BSNL is reportedly in talks with the Department of Telecom for some more time to make payment for the BWA spectrum, after its request for exemption from the payment was rejected by Department of Telecom.

An official source from BSNL in a brief interaction with CIOL said that the time line for payment will be decided by the end of this week.

Tuesday was the last date for making BWA payment from which the government was to get a total revenue of Rs 38,543.31 crore. Since BSNL skipped the payment of Rs 8,313.8 crore, the government could only garner Rs 30,229.51 crore from BWA auction winners.

On the other hand DoT is not pleased with this move of BSNL of skipping payment on the last date without any formal approval.

"We are thinking to take action on BSNL. It can be monetary fine on per day basis for this delay," said a senior official who did not wanted to be named.

As per the result declared by Department of Telecom, RIL-Infotel has to pay Rs 12,847.71 crore, BSNL Rs 8,313.8 crore, Qualcomm Rs 4912.54 crore, MTNL Rs 4533.97 crore, Aircel Rs 3,438.01, Bharti Airtel 3,314.36 crore, Tikona Digital Rs 1058.20 crore and Augere (Mauritius) Rs 124.66 crore.

Source http://www.ciol.com/News/News/News-Reports/BWA-winners-pay-spectrum-fees-BSNL-seeks-time/137984/0/