Bharti Airtel boss said Indian telecom industry has been under stress for the last three-and-a-half years and the government should ensure sustainability of the sector

The former bureaucrat said that Indian telecom is headed towards becoming a duopoly (Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel) with the remaining two players- Vodafone Idea and BSNL-MTNL - hurtling towards eventual shutdown

Supreme Court's recent order on the controversial AGR, asking telecom companies to pay Rs 1.47 lakh crore to Department of Telecommunications, has put the government in a tight spot

Vodafone stock price fell 15% intraday to the low of Rs 2.91, mere 0.30 points away from 52-week low of Rs 2.61. Bharti Airtel stock price earlier fell 2.3% to an intraday low of Rs 551, although it later touched a new 52-week high of Rs 568.6.

Share Market Update : Extending losses for the third consecutive session, BSE 30-share S&P Sensex closed 161 points lower at 40,894 and NSE 50-share index Nifty50 ended 53 points lower at 11,992

Telecom operators owe Rs 1.47 lakh crore to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) in Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) dues, following a Supreme Court order in October last year

Following a change in the Income-tax Act 2012, the Supreme Court had ruled that the Vodafone-Hutchison deal could not be taxed in India. This resulted in tax refund due to the company worth Rs 7,000 crore

Both Airtel and Vodafone Idea face huge monetary burden due to AGR, but none of them has said they will close down operations. Instead, both have said they will pay the AGR dues

The Supreme Court did not grant Vodafone Idea any relief, dealing a blow to the telco which has to pay Rs 53,000 crore to the DoT as part of its AGR dues

Share price of Bharti Airtel hit fresh high of Rs 568.60 compared to the previous close of Rs 565.10

Bharti Airtel's spokesperson confirmed to BusinessToday.In that, it will pay the balance amount after completing the exercise of calculating (AGR) dues across 22 circles which will take at least a week to ten days

Share price of Vodafone Idea gained over 18% to Rs 4.09 compared to the previous close of Rs 3.44 on BSE

The tax authorities are demanding a 15% service tax for the duration before GST came into force and 18% GST since July 1, 2017, when it was rolled out all over India

OIL believes that the Oct 24 judgement was not applicable to the company and had represented to the DoT stating that the demand raised was not sustainable either in law or on facts

Vodafone Idea, in filing to exchanges, said it's in the process of doing self-assessment of the dues and will pay the amount in the next few days

State Bank of India has nearly Rs 29,000 crore loan exposure in telecom sector, the highest among Indian banks. Apart from this, SBI has an additional Rs 14,000 crore in non-fund based exposure to telcos

Telecom companies were expecting a lenient deadline for paying their AGR dues. Instead, they were ordered to pay the dues immediately

At present, there are three private players in the Indian mobile market -- Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea and Reliance Jio -- besides the ailing state-owned operators BSNL/MTNL

The DoT, which faced the ire of Supreme Court for putting on hold recovery of dues from telecom companies, has started issuing circle or zone-wise demand notices to firms

Department of Telecommunications has started issuing circle or zone-wise demand notices to telecom firms, asking them to clear pending licence fees and spectrum usage charges before 11:59 pm on February 14