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JPC goes after NDA; to question Soli Sorabjee
Aditi Tandon
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, May 18
The Joint Parliamentary Committee looking into the implications of subsequent telecom policies on the 2G Spectrum scam today questioned the losses suffered due to a shift in policy made by the BJP-led NDA government in 1999.

Meeting under the chairmanship of Congress leader P.C. Chacko here, the 30-member JPC decided to summon the-then Attorney General Soli Sorabjee on whose advice the Cabinet approved the National Telecom Policy (NTP) 1999. It also directed Telecom Secretary R. Chandrashekhar (who briefed the committee on Spectrum allocation and pricing today) to quantify losses caused by the shift as mentioned by the CAG in its 2000 report.

Chacko: We are self-sufficient Chacko said there was no need for the JPC to look at the PAC report which did not exist officially. "We have collected more documents that any other committee. We need not look into any report that’s not official. We are self-sufficient," he said.

"The CAG made adverse remarks on the migration package for Cellular Mobile Service Providers (CMSPs) and Basic Service Operators (BSOs) and concessions granted to them on account of a shift from fixed licence fee regime to revenue sharing pattern in 1999. It said the shift caused huge losses but it did not quantify these losses probably due to lack of data. Although we don’t call it an attempt to cover up, we believe the losses can be quantified now. All committee members agreed to call the-then AG and to seek a report from the Telecom Secretary on the quantum of loss caused by the NDA Cabinet decision of July 6, 1999," Chacko said after the meeting during which Ashok Chandra, Wireless Advisor to Department of Telecommunication also briefed the panel on scientific aspects of radio frequency Spectrum.

At the heart of today’s debate was the NTP 1999 which allowed CMSPs and BSOs to migrate from fixed licence fee regime (which they were finding hard to honour as the fee was very high and the business generation low) under the NTP 1994 to a revenue sharing regime under which a share of 15 per cent of the Adjusted Gross Revenue was chargeable as licence fee from the service providers.

All existing CMSPs and BSOs migrated to revenue sharing from August 1, 1999 after the NDA took a decision. While this shift was said to have been based on AG Sorabjee’s advice, the same Sorabjee had earlier concurred with former Telecom Minister Jagmohan against such revenue sharing. Jagmohan was later sacked as Telecom Minister.

Importantly, the BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi-led Public Accounts Committee (PAC) which went into the 2G issue makes generous references to the NTP 1999 in its draft report: "The NTP 1999 stipulated the availability of affordable and effective communications for the citizen and open the sector to competitors, subject to recommendations of TRAI," it says.

The JPC, which has a Congress majority, obviously wants to know if the shift helped and who did it help. The ICICI Bank at that time was said to have prepared an industry friendly report which the NDA government considered favourably.