RCom gets a week to pay Rs 774.19 cr towards deferred spectrum liabilities

The Supreme Court on Wednesday gave Reliance Communications one week to pay Rs 774.19 crore towards deferred spectrum liabilities.

A bench led by Justice AK Goel gave RCom time till May 2 to pay its liability while disposing of the telecom firm’s two appeals challenging the TDSAT’s April 19 judgments that had refused to grant additional time to make the payment.

The company is liable to pay Rs 281.4 crore and Rs 492.8 crore towards the deferred spectrum liabilities arising out of the spectrum acquired in 2013 and 2015, respectively. The last date for payment of Rs 281.4 crore was April 5 and that of Rs 492.8 crore was April 19.

RCom had participated in 2015 auctions and was successful in the 800MHz band, 900 MHz band and the 1800 MHz bands in certain service areas for which it made an upfront payment of Rs 1,104.09 crore.

Similarly, RCom’s predecessor Sistema Shyam Tele Services (SSTL) had emerged as a successful bidder in the 2013 spectrum auctions and an amount Rs 1,626.3 crore was furnished upfront for eight circles. An amount of Rs 780.8 was also paid towards two installments.

Requesting the apex court to stay the TDSAT orders and restrain the DoT from taking any coercive steps against them, the companies had argued that the tribunal had failed to appreciate that they were willing to pay penal interest at 2% above the prime lending rate of the SBI for delay in making the payment.

In December 2017, as a part of its debt resolution plan, RCom had struck Rs 25,000-crore deal with Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio for sale of its mortgaged assets to avoid insolvency proceedings. These include spectrum, media convergence nodes, real estate, towers and fibre assets.

While the apex court had earlier this month allowed RCom to proceed with the sale of spectrum, media convergence nodes and real estate, the NCLAT last week stayed sale of its tower and fibre assets owned by tower firm Reliance Infratel.

Reliance Communications (RCOM)