Supreme Court rejects telecom service providers’ petitions

New Delhi : A bunch of petitions filed by Various telecom companies, among them Bharti Airtel, Idea, Vodafone and Reliance for extension of their existing spectrum licences in various circles across the country has been dismissed by the Supreme Court on Thursday.

“We see no merit in the petition, The petitions are dismissed,” said an apex court bench headed by Justice J. Chelameswar while dismissing the batch of petitions.

The Supreme Court had reserved its verdict on a bunch of similar petitions filed by Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular, Vodafone Mobile Services and Loop Mobile India which had sought extension of their 20-year spectrum licences by another 10 years.

The telecom operators had challenged the government's decision to reject their applications for extension of their licences and auction the spectrum surrendered by them.

While telecom companies have argued that the terms and conditions of their 20-year licences state that they were extendable by another 10 years, the government has argued that the norms say it "may" extend the licence, and hence the matter was at its discretion.

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