Blame it on Telegraph Act, says Khullar

As the telecom industry debates what constitutes revenue from services, Trai Chairman Rahul Khullar today said the archaic Indian Telegraph Act is responsible for the confusion as it can be "interpreted in any way".
"If you have heard others on how DoT interprets one thing in a manner on one day and in another way on other day, there is an act which is dating to 1885, I guarantee you that it can be interpreted in any way," TRAI Chairman Rahul Khullar said at an open house discussion.
The discussion was defining revenue on which the government should levy tax.

Government at present charges spectrum and licence fee annually on a part of revenue earned by operators. It is called Adjusted Gross Revenue which is derived after deduction certain non-telecom revenue from gross income of a company.
The definition of AGR has been in litigation since 2003.
Telecom operators have often questioned the inclusion of various components of revenue in the reckoning of AGR as well as the legality of the definition.

The move of DoT to collect fee as percentage of telecom company's revenue started after government in 1999 offered migration package to telecom operators on revenue sharing basis.

"At some stage we go to wake up. We are working with an 1885 act, 129 years are over and somehow we don't see need to change it. Still puzzles me why we persevere with archaic law. Anyway I can't do much as I am not government," Khullar said.
Industry raised issue saying they are often confused on definition of revenue which leads to litigation.
A telecom company wondered even insurance claim obtained for damages to infrastructure due to flood or some other unexpected situation should also be considered as income from telecom services.
Another stakeholder cited the example of Delhi Metro, which has a telecom licence for their internal network but earns revenue from passengers.

Khullar said: "We need to come up with recommendation that is considered by government rather than going to trash," Khullar said.
TRAI has given telecom companies to submit their extra comments if any by October 9.