On 1st Sept 2020, the historic AGR case, which had rattled the telecom sector for the past two decades, concluded with the SC judgment. The overall impact on the sector is a staggering Rupees One Lakh Sixty-Nine Thousand Crores (22.8 billion USD). It looks hilarious, that it took such a long time to settle something so fundamental – the basis of the settlement of 1999 between the government and the telecom operators. Lot has been written about it, but in this note, I plan to point to key mistakes that were committed (by all concerns) – leading to this mess.
Mistake No.1 – DoT had deliberately left the key term (definition of revenue) open in their proposed package for migration (from fixed license fees to revenue share) dated 22nd July 1999 [clause iii]. By doing so they had set the expectation that they will decide the same later based on a fair consultation process run by TRAI.
