3G roaming: Delhi HC grants Bharti Airtel interim relief

Telecom major Bharti Airtel has got interim relief till May 8 from the Delhi High Court which stayed the government order asking the firm to immediately stop 3G services in select regions.

The court has stayed the execution of a department of telecommunications (DoT) order to immediately stop 3G mobile services by companies where they do not own licences. The court also let the telco continue its 3G roaming pacts until the next hearing, scheduled for May 8.

ith the stay, Airtel will not have to pay the Rs 350-crore penalty, imposed on it by the DoT, till the court gives the final order. Reuters[/caption]

The order was challenged by Bharti Airtel whom the department had asked to stop offering the services in seven zones where it was doing so through sharing of the airwaves with service providers which had the licences for those zones.

The Delhi High Court also said Airtel would not immediately need to pay the penalty. The court has, however, asked the operator to maintain a separate account for its 3G revenue. DoT will invoke a bank guarantee if Bharti loses the case.

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This is the second time the High Court has come to the operator's rescue. Last year, Airtel had challenged a similar order from the DoT after which the court directed the department to take action only after hearing out the operator.

The case relates to the 3G auctions for airwaves in 2010 where no company had won the band for pan-India. As the companies began to roll out their services it meant they had to use each other's spectrum.

Last year, the DoT sent show-cause notices to Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular among others, asking them to stop providing 3G mobile data services through roaming pacts outside their licensed zones as it deemed the pacts "illegal".

The government sold 3G airwaves in an auction in 2010 that attracted much higher bids than expected, and no single company managed to get spectrum for all of the country's 22 zones.

The government passed an order, asking telecom companies to stop offering 3G services beyond their licensed circles or zones under mutual roaming agreements. Several telecom companies -- including Airtel, Vodafone, Idea, Aircel and Tata Teleservices -- had filed petitions in the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT), challenging the December 23, 2011, directive of DoT to scrap their intra-circle roaming pacts within 24 hour

DoT is currently preparing separate notices for Vodafone and Idea Cellular in this regard and court's final judgment will impact these players as well.

With inputs from Reuters