The telecom regulator on Thursday halved the international call termination charges and slashed the operators’ revenue sharing with the government in a bid to aid the politically-licensed gateway operators. The new rate of 1.5 US cents for international call termination per minute might be applicable with effect from July 1 instead of the date of approval as the telecom ministry has bowed down to the pressure of the IGW operators, said ministry sources.
The Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission on Thursday issued a directive lowering the international call termination charge taken by the IGWs to 1.5 cents from 3 cents after the prime minister Sheikh Hasina approved the proposal earlier this month.
The government revenue sharing in the charge was also lowered to 40 per cent from 51.75 per cent.
The revenue sharing of the IGW operators was raised to 20 per cent from 13.25 per cent.
The call charges and revenue sharing rates were lowered mainly to give benefits to the 25 IGWs which got licences in 2012 because of their strong connections with the ruling party Awami League.
The BTRC directive said that the new rates and revenue sharing would remain effective for 6 months. ‘The next steps will be taken on the basis of call volume and government revenue earning during the period,’ it said.
The BTRC directive, however, did not specify when the new rate will come into effect.
The BTRC also increased the revenue sharing of the interconnection exchange operators to 17.50 per cent from 15 per cent and that of access network service operators to 22.5 per cent from 20 per cent.
The BTRC in July last year sent a proposal to the telecom ministry for lowering the incoming international call charges and reducing the government revenue sharing but the telecom regulator admitted that it would cause a revenue loss of Tk 1,074 crore annually.
The BTRC calculated the revenue loss showing the legal incoming calls in the country was 35 million minutes per day.
After the finance ministry rejected the proposal in March 2014, the BTRC sent a second proposal twisting the call volume at 80 million minutes per day instead of 35 million minutes per day.
‘We hope that if the tariff cut comes into effect then it will stop illegal call termination and the average call per day will increase to 80 million minutes,’ said the second proposal of BTRC.
BTRC’s projected second calculation, however, showed a government loss of Tk 73 crore.
The finance ministry again rejected the proposal and asked BTRC to conduct a baseline study on the matter.
BTRC officials said that some powerful IGW operators lobbied the government high-ups and the proposal was finally sent to the prime minister who gave the approval.
The 25 IGW operators have been facing stiff competitions in the overcrowded market since their inception in 2012
The regulator had proposed at best 10 more licences when there was four operators, but the government awarded 25 IGW and 23 ICX licences in 2012.
BTRC officials said most of the politically licensed IGWs were yet to pay hundreds of crores of taka and the regulator was facing trouble in realising the amount from the IGW operators because of their strong political links.
The telecom regulator has also initiated legal proceedings to realise the dues from some of the IGW operators but no one knows when the proceedings will end, said the officials.
-With New Age input
