Govt Considering Out-Of-Court Settlement Of Ongoing Legal Cases With Telecom Companies: Report

After announcing major telecom reforms last month, the government is now considering to settle the ongoing legal cases with the telecom companies to reduce the litigation burden on the industry.

The Centre is mulling over settling of ongoing cases with telcos through an out-of-court settlement process, reports Economic Times.

Further, the Centre is also looking to abolish the existing spectrum usage charge (SUC).

"Telcos and the government are locked in numerous court cases and the only ones benefiting out of this are lawyers. Telcos themselves want these court cases settled as soon as possible and the government also wants to reduce the burden on telcos so that the sector grows healthily," a senior government official was quoted in the report as saying.

The official added that a mechanism akin to Income Tax department's 'Vivad Se Vishwas' tax dispute resolution scheme may be a good way to the reduce the litigation in the telecom sector.

'Vivad Se Vishwas' scheme was launched in March 2020 to reduce income-tax related litigation. The scheme allowed taxpayers to clear their outstanding dues by paying only the tax component of the overall demand by the authorities while the interest and penalty amounts parts were waived off by the government.

The official, however, added that the details of the scheme are still under consideration and yet to be worked out.