The Supreme Court on Friday directed the troubled telcos including Reliance Communications Ltd (RCom), Aircel Group and Videocon Telecommunications Ltd to submit details of spectrum sharing agreements that they have entered into.
The Apex court also asked for the spectrum sharing agreement between Anil Ambani-owned RComm and Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Jio to be placed on record, CNBCTV18 reported on Friday.
A bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra asked counsel representing the resolution professional of RCom, Shyam Divan, that if RCom spectrum being used by Reliance Jio? If yes, then since when?
To this, CNBCTV18 quoted Divan as saying, “I will seek instructions on that. I have a partial answer. There is a part of my spectrum lying idle with me. I have an asset sharing contractual arrangement with Jio and that has been reported to the DOT and the fee to liberalize such spectrum has been paid.”
To answer Justice Mishra’s question on Reliance Jio’s usage of RCom spectrum, advocate Diwan said, “The sharing arrangement was entered into in 2016 with Jio – 800 MHZ spectrum.”
The top court adjourned the hearing on staggered repayment of telecom companies’ AGR dues till August 17.
Earlier on August 10, the court had asked Department of Telecom (DoT) Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the DoT, to apprise it as to how it plans to recover the AGR related dues from companies like RCOM, Aircel and Videocon go into insolvency then what would happen to the said amount.
It also asked whether spectrum given to these companies can be sold.
The DoT had told the top court that their stand is that the spectrum cannot be sold by the telecom companies facing insolvency proceedings as it is not their property.
A bench of Justices Arun Mishra, S Abdul Nazeer and M R Shah had then asked Mehta on how the DoT will recover Rs 31,000 from RCOM and Rs 12,000 crore from Aircel.