TRAI recommends penalty on Airtel, Vodafone and Idea

In a setback to incumbent telecom operators, sector regulator TRAI has suggested imposing three thousand crore rupees penalty on Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea for allegedly denying inter-connectivity to newcomer Reliance Jio. TRAI, in its recommendation to the Department of Telecom, said it has found the trio to be non-compliant with licence conditions and service quality norms given

the high rate of call failures and congestion at interconnect points for R-Jio. It also noted that denial of interconnection by these operators to R-Jio "appears to be with the ulterior motive to stifle competition and is anti-consumer".

The recommendation came on complaint by Reliance Jio that over 75 per cent of calls on its network are failing as incumbents were not giving sufficient points of interconnect that would help complete calls.

TRAI in a detailed letter to the DoT Secretary said the action of the three incumbent operators was "against public interest".