When Mukesh Ambani acquired RComm's assets, he acquired its liabilities too and now Reliance Jio group must pay Rs.31,000 cr
August 14, Friday – is a bad day for Mukesh Ambani. He has been caught by the Supreme Court for evading to pay the dues of his debt-ridden brother Anil Ambani’s company which currently owes more than Rs.31,000 crores to the Department of Telecom. During the arguments on the controversial Telecom AGR (Adjusted Gross Revenue) non-payment issue, the Supreme Court found that Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio is using the spectrum of Anil Ambani’s Reliance Communications (RComm) since 2016. Anil’s RCommm is almost taken over by Mukesh at zero value by taking over its assets on the condition that it will also take up its liabilities.
Reliance Jio recently got a bumper of more than Rs.1.5 lakh crores by selling some portions of itself to many multinational companies such as Facebook, Google, etc. Here the role of Government is also dubious as it did not collect the dues from these big telecom players. Even after winning the case in the Supreme Court, we have seen what all dubious activities are done by the Narendra Modi Government by not collecting dues from the Ambanis, Birla, Mittal, Tata Group, etc. The strange thing is that even Opposition parties are not criticizing the Government for these dubious activities in helping Corporates!
The bench of Justices Arun Mishra, S Abdul Nazeer and M R Shah asked the counsels of Reliance Jio and RComm to place their spectrum sharing agreements on record.
The Supreme Court on Friday sought details of the spectrum sharing pact between Reliance Communications (RComm) and Reliance Jio and said as to why the company using the spectrum of the other firm cannot be asked to pay the Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) related dues to the government.
“Spectrum is government property, not private, and anyone using it is liable to pay the dues”, the apex court said. The bench of Justices Arun Mishra, S Abdul Nazeer and M R Shah asked the counsels of Reliance Jio and RComm to place their spectrum sharing agreements on record.
The bench also asked the Department of Telecom (DoT) to file the requisite documents in this regard and posted the matter for further hearing on August 17.
During the hearing, senior advocate Shyam Divan, appearing for the resolution professional for RComm, said that the government has been informed about the spectrum sharing agreement which was done in 2016 and the required fees have been paid. He said that a part of the spectrum was lying idle with the company for a while and it has not been traded but has only shared.
The bench then said as to why it cannot ask Reliance Jio to pay the AGR related dues on behalf of RComm as the outstanding amount arises from the spectrum use and Jio has been using it for three years. When Divan stated that the lenders have approved UV Asset Reconstruction Company’s resolution plan for RComm, the bench said it wanted to know who was backing the UV ARC.
Vodafone Idea has to pay a balance of Rs 50,399 crores, while Bharti Airtel’s outstanding amount is Rs 25,976 crores, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said during a hearing on July 20.
Senior advocate K V Vishwanathan, appearing for Jio, said that the company has already paid its AGR related dues but on this question, he needs to seek instructions. He tried to explain to the bench the spectrum sharing and spectrum usage guidelines, and said that the company was following all the rules and paying the requisite fees.
The bench said again as to how Reliance Jio can escape the liability when it is using the spectrum and sharing the revenue?
The top court is expected to allow 15 years’ time for telecom firms to pay the dues, rejecting the Government’s 20-year offer. Vodafone Idea has to pay a balance of Rs 50,399 crores, while Bharti Airtel’s outstanding amount is Rs 25,976 crores, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said during a hearing on July 20.
Now Supreme Court is looking into the dues of bankruptcy-facing firms like Anil Ambani’s RComm (whose spectrum is being used by Mukesh Ambani’s Jio), Videocon and former Finance Minister Chidambaram’s bribery scam-hit Aircel.
With PTI inputs…
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It is indeed a unfortunate situation.Mukesh should have make payment of liabilities of R.COM in terms of agreements.The government should have taken hard steps for recovery,come what may.The country will celebrate 75 years of independence after two years.The irony is we the people of the country become charitable and sentimental while voting and opposition in parliament most of the times remains weak which is unhealty for a strong democracy.All big houses are the most benificieries NOT COMMON MEN...SORRY SIR
I like this blog very much so much superb info.
The telecom players are going to wind up shop in India in not so distant a future...already running into major losses...giving away freebies on one hand and having to bear the brunt of such taxes would not let them survive...the never ending ask of Indians in getting everything free is killing the industries worse than anything else
You are right 100% Rajarshi Chatterjee....Old habits die hard says a PROVERB...."GARIBI HATAO" HAS KILLED THE TELCOM ENTERPRISES 1) TATA DOCOMO, 2) IDEA with VODAFONE and now JIO Telecom who gave the lowest rate of phone calls to the INDIANS. This Government has no intention of collecting DUES from another Corporate House belonging to Anil Ambani - RCOMM which is liquidated and ASSETS TAKEN OVER by JIO. Courts are intervening but taking 4 years to announce.
There is no point in blaming Telcos. They should pay the existing taxes and old arrears.Supreme court is correct in pointing out the non payment of spectrum arrears when Jio took over Spectrum of Rcom. Why C&AG has not pointed this short collection in its annual reports by to the parliament. Who is responsible for this omission..such short collection amounting to thousands of crores. Now coming to telephone and datacharges are concerned they are reasonable in comparison to rates prevailing in other countries
Let us make sure that we have 4 big companies so that the rates could be competitive without leading to monopolistic tendencies.The government should regulate these companies so that public needs are met at most competitive prices
Really Really Thank you Supreme court
I bow to judiciary
Ask him to pay the vendors also who worked for him and his brother
Ask the big brother to pay the vendors who worked for Anil Ambani and left in lurch without any payment I have around 7.5 million still pending with the Anil's company and around 2 million with Mukesh Ambani jio
What a journalism. Hatsoff to you people, i really don’t subscribe to any news pages but this one particular articles gives anyone a goosebumps. And for the people who is paying sympathy towards Airtel and other telecom companies, where were you when they were looting public? How come they have made unlimited calling, daily data, Messages, caller tunes suddenly in Rs 149 only? As far as i know that we used to pay a hectic of amount for data and that was also bit low. Hope the govt wont waste this amount of 1.5 lac crores in total.
This article is Absolutely illetrate people work.
Government is trying to give time of 20 years to telecos so that they can pay in installment.
Which corporate house can pay 30000 crore to 60000 crore in a day.
They will go bankrupt as already told by vadafone idea and lakhs will loose job.
15 years time to repay? Are you serious?
We all know they have dominated the market by their nasty game and just have their shares bought by International companies and have abundant funds readily available. Why dont we give them just 6 months?
Does a common man get 15 years to repay in such circumstances?
I know they create job opportunities but they are currently doing exceptionally well with their financial status.