The department of telecommunications (DoT) has broadened the scope of the special audit on the country’s largest telecom operator, Bharti Airtel. The audit will now also probe whether the company has been underpaying the spectrum usage charge for the fiscal 2007-08 and 2008-09. Bharti Airtel along with Vodafone-Essar, Tata Teleservices Ltd (TTSL) and Idea Cellular came under the scanner of special audit for allegedly not reporting the revenue on sale of handsets that were bundled with some talk-time.
According to sources, the government has contended that Bharti Airtel has been following the practice of excluding the wireline revenue from the adjusted gross revenue (AGR) while calculating the spectrum usage charge as well as the licence fee despite the unified access service licence (UASL) not allowing for such a provision. The provisions of the USAL while migrating from the basic service (BS) state that licence fee for the wireless licence for base stations and wireless subscriber would be computed as a percentage of the AGR. While calculating the AGR for levying the licence fee and royalty from the wireline subscribers shall not be taken into account.
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