 Hello and let's talk about Vodafone, telecom companies and adjusted gross revenues. I'm Pragya. Telecom company Vodafone says that they might go under if they pay the government their AGR dues. This dispute reached the Supreme Court and on 14th February the Supreme Court ordered telecom companies to pay their dues of over 1 trillion rupees to the government. The Supreme Court has interpreted this dispute in favor of the government which has been demanding this payment but the court also did two other things. It has said that even public sector oil companies would have to pay a share of their revenue as tax. The oil PSUs actually now owe a bigger sum to the government than the telecom companies. Reliance on Geo began its telecom operations in 2017 therefore its AGR dues are negligible. The court has said that the companies must pay up soon. Vodafone says there is no possibility of this happening. Both the Indian and foreign partners of the company have declined to invest further sums in this company. The other concern which the RBI has is that if Vodafone picks up a loan from an Indian PSU bank then it would get its AGR dues but we may face a situation where the government has to bail out the bank. So it's a sort of vicious cycle. To discuss this issue we have with our senior journalist Paranjoy He's going to tell us whether the oil companies are collateral victims in this war and what happens to Vodafone first? Vodafone is the most vulnerable of all these companies and the chances of it going under seem very real. But let's go step by step. Let's first explain what is AGR? Adjusted, gross, revenues. What are these? Telecom companies pay certain dues to the government. In this case the Department of Telecommunications. What are these? They pay what are called spectrum usage charges. The spectrum that has been given to them that's one. The other is license fees that they get. Now over the years and it's not today this dispute on how you calculate the adjusted gross revenue has been going on for over 15 years now. Now the telecom companies had a certain point of view. The government has a certain point of view and these have been changing. The controller and auditor general of India which is a constitutional authority is saying government you are foregoing your dues. So this dispute had been going on until it reached ahead on the 24th October on the 24th of October 2019. A bench of the Supreme Court comprising justices Arun Mishra, S. Abdul Nazir and M.R. Shah said you have to pay this money. Right. And that amount is huge. That amount comes to 1.33 lakh crores. Then the bulk of it is obviously with the telecom companies. Now when you break it down you see who are the big players. The big guys were Airtel, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone. Both of them had to pay 42,000 crores. In one case about over 50,000 crores, 53,000 crores. Now what had happened was a various kind of okay first the petition then the review petition and finally the Supreme Court says no you have to pay. I mean who do you think the Supreme Court is? You pay honor and criticize the government for being soft on these companies. Now the government has tried to work out various ways in which it ensures that this company in particular Vodafone doesn't go under. And remember this is not the first time it's happened. Mr. Kumar Mangalam Birla who heads idea cellular which has merged with Vodafone has gone on record saying if the government does not give us relief we won't have a choice. We'll go under. Earlier the head of Vodafone in the United Kingdom Nick Reed he'd gone on record. Remember this is India's second largest telecom company. Today you have realized you as number one you have Vodafone you have Bharti Airtel. Now at a press conference on the 12th of November Mr. Nick Reed was quoted by the media that he was devastating on the government. He says Indian official dumb welcomed Vodafone with all the warmth of a Himalayan mountaintop. I mean you can't get more sarcastic like that. He's been they've been fighting cases they've been a soft target for politicians and tax men and he said the destruction of value has been complete. He said regulatory authorities have not been supportive. The following day Mr. Reed sort of issues a statement say no no no we want to be in India and the story is Mr. Ravi Shankar Prasad the communications minister apparently gave him a year full. At the end of the day Vodafone has been very very vulnerable it's been telling the government that help us out bail us out otherwise we're going to go under and remember this is the biggest foreign direct investment of its kind. Now on Monday Bharti Airtel paid 10,000 crores to the department of telecommunications Vodafone says that we're going to make a payment that we're going to give 2,500 crores that's Monday and by Friday we'll give you another thousand crores. Now the Supreme Court does not accept its plan. Today we're in a situation where the international media is saying it's going to go on down and and and let me just quote to you the headline of an item by the international news agency Reuters an article written by Sankal. Sankal Parthiaal of Tav Hamid. The headline says if Vodafone idea disconnects India picks up the bill. Right now one more one more line. He says India faces a multi-billion dollar hit to its economy and a tarnished reputation as a place for multinationals to invest unless it can keep Vodafone idea in business. Right so there was a letter which recently came from a junior official which said that there'll be no coercive action what does this really reflect? Now the Supreme Court bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra was livid and said who are this is the section officer going to decide you know what the apex court the highest court of the land is like the point is very simple. I think Justice Mishra knows the whole world knows these so-called junior officers these section officers don't write anything unless they get the approval of the highest. So there was definitely a section within the government who felt that if we take coercive action that means this company will go under that's bad news you know it could increase the fiscal deficit you're not able to create jobs and then hello you know Vodafone has 13,000 employees so are you going to throw them out of a job? No that's not all Vodafone is in debt it's taken thousands of crores of loans and if it doesn't pay these loans who's going to suffer banks are going to suffer the country is going to suffer yes. Now could this situation have been avoided? You know there's this discussion has been going on for donkeys years you know ever since that Supreme Court judge there was a high part committee set up with the cabinet secretary the telecom secretary the finance secretary law and justice etc etc etc the idea was to work out a package how do you how did they were they were stalked then the government gave a moratorium on payment of spectrum so there were all kinds of packages being sorted out and surely there were discussions going on within finance minister Nirmala Sitaraman and telecom minister Ravi Shankar Prasad all to you know say that hello let's see how we can amicably resolve this because if Vodafone India's second largest privately owned telecom service provider goes under it's bad news for everybody including this country. Why is it such bad news? Because you're going to end up with a duopoly already your public sector which is Bharat Sanchad Nigam Limited and Mahanagat Mahanagat Telephone Nigam Limited isn't dual drums they've offered a voluntary sort of a voluntary retirement program and large numbers of employees have taken it over I've taken availed of the service but the point is is it good for the country where you have a player who's just been around for a little over three years I mean after all Vodafone's been there much longer it's an international multinational do you want only two players here is a country where once upon a time you had no less than 15 telecom companies are you going to come down to just a handful now you can say 15 with too much you know only three remain now now three means I include BSNL, MTNL as one though they're two separate companies is it good that you have India's richest man Mr Mukesh Ambani heading reliance duo who started in in 2016 so it's been around for just three and a half years or thereabouts should become the leader and you have a poor second Sunil Bharti Mittal once upon a time he says we are one of the world's largest telecom service providers and it is all over the west asia all over Africa and today he's struggling to survive and at the end of the day you use your smartphone I mean why have the why have the services deteriorated we didn't have to pay for voice now we do and why has the service deteriorated why have you having to make the same call three or four times because investments are not being made the telecom sector is steeped in debt one estimate says it's over 700,000 crores I mean that's bad news right I mean so if they're so steeped in debt that they're not investing in the infrastructure in services then at the end of the day do we want the company headed by India's richest man to have a monopoly right now we are moving towards a duopoly if Vodafone idea goes under right and in any case MTN and BSN will have in some ways been allowed to sort of wither away that's another story that's a story of how the public sector has been allowed to absolutely you know it's been it's been treated very very badly I mean the government has not supported the public sector I mean that's ideologically driven that's this government earlier governments did differently but this government has gone ahead I mean they I guess they don't want Paranjoy what happens to the oil companies which have now been included in the ambit what does this mean that's a good good good good issue to discuss I think the supreme court in my humble opinion should do a rethink look this is collateral damage as you likely pointed out you know I mean they have availed of certain services and they have allegedly not paid what they owe to the government but in the process look are you going to ruin an already terrible economy I mean look your economy is growing at its slowest pace according in the last 11 years according to the government of India statistics many people doubt these statistics your industrial production has been negative your trade your exports and imports have been negative you're not not able to create jobs and hello you're seeing a demand recession you're seeing even electricity demand in a energy short country you're seeing electricity demand coming down are we in this situation where and already I mean the economy is in a terrible shape and you wanted to get even worse the telecom companies say that they want to pay in tranches they want a little bit of a break would that work out really if they don't have money you know I can't predict the future I really can't predict the future just as I can't predict the way in which the supreme court of India or the government of India acts we'll have to wait and watch but things are very very very messy at this juncture as we are talking all right okay thanks for joining us for enjoying that yeah so you know we moved to another story this time from Lucknow a group of students and activists were arrested as they marched from Chowri Chowra near Gorakhpur in UP to Raj Ghat in Delhi they were marching against the proposed nationwide national register of citizens they were arrested in Ghazipur in UP again the police has accused these young students and activists of misleading people and instigating the citizens against the CAA and it has called their Yatra illegal now the Yatra has been resumed because they have been released but they have had harrowing time in this short video they narrate the story of their march the events that led to their arrest and what it was like being thrown in the lock up by the Uttar Pradesh police the first thing we realized was that the situation was very bad although we were saying that at least for us it was a bad time but the situation was the way it was with the food and all the training was the way it was the district police because it was very difficult in the beginning the FIAT didn't speak any English so the district police was behaving the same way slowly when people started coming Ghazipur's sansa came and the local department came so slowly the district police started to come a little bit slowly but I saw that for example we ask for pen papers from them give them pen and a diary give them papers they have been giving them for three days they have been asking for books for three days they have not given books our books that we were arrested in the jail they have been giving us books they have not given us books so after three days, after four days they bring some books when we left the police, we found out that we have been arrested in the 7-11-7-16 the situation was very bad, we were asked for 2.5 lakhs of bail and to die, it is very difficult to get rid of the people in the other city but how did we get rid of some applications for bail after moving the problem is that the administration is in its office the administration is not existing, it seems like that Babu is missing, Mr. SDM has kept his house and after asking anyone, there is no answer, everyone says you should understand that it is a pressure from above this pressure from above, I don't know how much pressure from above that there is no paper Babu is not in the office, he is going to have dinner in 10 minutes SDM is in the house he is saying that he has reached the house, we are on our executive work here and you should understand that we will not be able to leave the demand of the Gusted Papers and the unoptionable if they had a bus, they would have said that the storm in Mumbai will bring the fish out so we were not able to complete the conditions yesterday evening we left and today is 17th, we started our journey from Ghazipur one day the students of B.H.U.C. were kept in a car and we left B.H.U.C. and one day we started our journey from Ghazipur to Saedpur and after two days we started our journey