India top court rejects telcos' plea on dues owed to govt, shares slump (updated)

Indus Towers

19/09/2024 07:48

(Changes sourcing, adds shares and context in paragraphs 2-6)
       BENGALURU, Sept. 19 (Reuters) - India's Supreme Court on
Thursday rejected a request by telecom companies including
Vodafone Idea  VODA.NS  and Bharti Airtel  BRTI.NS  to
recalculate how much they owe the government in licence fees, a
court order showed.
    Shares of Vodafone Idea  VODA.NS  and Indus Towers  INUS.NS 
slumped around 15% each after the news, while Bharti Airtel
 BRTI.NS  briefly turned negative.
    The companies had argued that the country's
telecommunications department made significant errors in
calculating the adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues, the basis for
license fee calculation owed to the government.
    Vodafone Idea, Bharti Airtel and Indus Towers did not
immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment.
    The top court had in 2021 rejected a similar plea to correct
errors in AGR calculation, arguing that it should only take into
account revenue accrued from their core services.
    The government had argued that it should include non-core
revenue as well, such as money from rent or land sales.

 (Reporting by Aleef Jahan in Bengaluru, Arpan Chaturvedi in New
Delhi; Editing by Nivedita Bhattacharjee)
 ((aleefjahan.cs@thomsonreuters.com;))