Telecom Companies Pay Rs 10,808 cr,help Govt Keep Fiscal Deficit in Check

Successful spectrum bidders, including Bharti Airtel, Reliance Jio and Idea, have made Rs 10,808 crore towards upfront payments, helping the government meet its fiscal deficit target of 4.1 per cent for 2014-15.

Although the telecom companies have time till April 8 to make total upfront payment of Rs 28,872 crore for spectrum won by them, they made part payments to the government to help it meet the fiscal deficit target in the fiscal ended today.

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"I made an appeal to all successful companies to make payment keeping the country's image on fiscal deficit in mind. I would like to thank all those companies who have made payments considering my appeal," Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad told PTI.

Official sources said that telecom companies paid Rs 10,808 crore on the last day of the financial year. Bharti Airtel made part payment of Rs 4,725 crore followed by Reliance Jio (Rs 2,518 crore), Idea Cellular (Rs 1,935 crore), Vodafone (Rs 1,030 crore) and Tata Teleservices (Rs 600 crore).

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The payment, they said, will help the government in keeping the fiscal deficit within the target of 4.1 per cent of the GDP, or about Rs 5.12 lakh crore, for 2014-15. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had said that efforts would be made to keep fiscal deficit at 4.1 per cent of the GDP.

As per the new roadmap, fiscal deficit will be 3.9 per cent in 2015-16, 3.5 per cent in 2016-17 and 3 per cent by 2017-18. As per DoT, the upfront payment due to Idea is Rs 7,790.1 crore; Airtel Rs 7,832.58 crore; Vodafone Rs 6,867.93 crore; Reliance Jio Rs 2,519.38 crore; Tata Teleservices Rs 2,013.33 crore; RCom Rs 1,106.95 crore and Aircel Rs 742.5 crore.

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The 19-day spectrum auction that ended on March 25 evoked good response from the industry and bids worth Rs 1,09,874.91 crore were received from seven companies.

As per the final results, Idea made total commitment of Rs 30,306.98 crore followed by Airtel at Rs 29,130.20 crore, Vodafone Rs 29,959.74 crore, Reliance Jio Infocomm Rs 10,077.53 crore, Reliance Communication Rs 4,299.13 crore, Tata Teleservices Rs 7,851.33 crore and Aircel Rs 2,250 crore.

Source: PTI