The regulations will also have provisions for a daily penalty of up to Rs 1 lakh per service area for operators violating the new norms
Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has issued new regulations for interconnection between service providers, making it mandatory for them to enter into such agreements on a non-discriminatory basis within 30 days of receiving a request from another operator.
These regulations will come into place from February 1 this year and also have provisions for a daily penalty of up to Rs 1 lakh per service area for operators violating the new norms, Trai said on Tuesday while releasing 'Telecom Interconnection Regulations 2018'.
The development has come after a war of words between new entrant Reliance Jio (RJio) and legacy players such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea over not giving points of interconnect to RJio. It had snowballed into a big issue leading to a recommendation of penalty of Rs 3,050 crore by Trai on the three big incumbents – Airtel, Vodafone and Idea -- for violation of licence agreements.
The recommendation of penalty is being examined by a committee under the Department of Telecommunications.
The regulations will apply to all the service providers offering telecom services in India. "Through these regulations, the authority has mandated that every service provider shall, within thirty days of receipt of request from a service provider, enter into interconnection agreement on non-discriminatory basis, with such service provider," Trai said.
The telecom regulator has fixed five days for service providers to respond to interconnection seekers with a draft interconnect pact.
For provisioning of ports at the points of interconnect, Trai has fixed 30-day time-frame instead of the 90 days earlier.
"The interconnection charges such as set-up charges and infrastructure charges may be mutually negotiated between service providers subject to the regulations or directions issued by the authority... provided that such charges are reasonable, transparent and non-discriminatory," Trai said.
For disconnection of the ports, a service provider would have to now give a show-cause notice of 15 working days to the other telco clearly disclosing the reasons for the proposed disconnection. If not satisfied by the reply or in case no reply is received, the operator will give a notice of 15 days specifying the disconnection date for points of interconnect.
The new regulations cover important aspects of interconnection such as interconnection agreement, provisioning of initial interconnection and augmentation of points of interconnections, disconnection of ports and financial disincentive on interconnection issues.
The rules have come after a detailed consultation process by Trai started in October 2016.
...& ANALYSIS
- The regulations will also have provisions for a daily penalty of up to Rs 1 lakh per service area for operators violating the new norms
- The telecom regulator has fixed five days for service providers to respond to interconnection seekers with a draft interconnect pact
- For provisioning of ports at the points of interconnect, Trai has fixed 30-day time-frame instead of the 90 days earlier
- For disconnection of the ports, a service provider would have to now give a show-cause notice of 15 working days to the other telco clearly disclosing the reasons for the proposed disconnection
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