The Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission is likely to amend the guideline for the interconnection exchange operators with a provision to realise dues from the performance bank guarantee. BTRC officials said the commission had already discussed about the possible changes in the ICX guideline as 25 ICX companies had dues worth Tk 389.20 crore in revenue share.‘The commission is likely to amend the guideline of the ICX operators as in the present guideline the government can only cut PBG for rollout failure,’ a senior BTRC official told New Age on Tuesday.
He said the commission had also decided to take administrative action against the companies which were delaying to pay the dues.
‘We will give the operators some time and if they fail to pay by that time then, in cases to case basis, we will suspend or limit their operation,’ the official said.
The BTRC in 2012 had proposed at best 10 more licences, but the government, on political consideration, awarded 25 IGW, 23 ICX and 34 IIG licences raising the number of gateway licences to 91.
Before 2012 there were two ICX operators.
The telecom regulator in January had also amended the international gateway operators’ guideline to realise revenue sharing dues from performance bank guarantee.
According to the BTRC data last week, Getco Telecommunication has dues worth Tk 32 crore, M&H Telecom Tk 40 crore, Bangla ICX Ltd Tk 18 crore, Voicetel Ltd Tk 36 crore, Bantel Ltd Tk 12 crore, Integrated Service Ltd Tk 39 crore, Jibandhara Solution Tk 9 crore, Cross World Telecom Tk 6 crore, Tele Exchange Tk 14 crore and Micre Trade Tk 29 crore.
The data also showed that Bangla Telecom has dues worth Tk 5 crore, Vertex Communication Tk 9 crore, Agni System Tk 17 crore, Paradise Telecom Tk 17 crore, Teleplus Network Tk 2 crore, Gazi Networks Tk 6 crore, Ring Tech BD Tk 19 crore, Mother Telecommunications Tk 1 crore, Cloud Tel Tk 7 crore, New Generation Telecom Tk 10 crore, Imam Network Tk 7 crore, Soft Tex Ltd Tk 8 crore, Purple Telecom Tk 5 crore, SR Telecom Tk 5 crore
and MM Communications has dues worth Tk 25 crore.
The BTRC in September last year had blocked 10 international gateway operators for not paying dues worth Tk 275 crore.
-With New Age input
