The 2G and 3G spectrum auctions may be rescheduled once again as stakeholders found no positive outcome from yesterday’s meeting with the finance minister and two other regulators on SIM replacement tax issue.
According to the deferred schedule, April 16 is the last date for filling the application for two different band spectrum auctions. The bid was rescheduled on May 20.
The auctions scheduled on April 30 was changed following the mobile phone operators’ tough stance on finding solution to SIM replacement tax issue which included more than Tk2,000 crore.
A senior executive of a leading mobile phone operator said as there was no positive outcome from the meeting, it is obvious to reschedule the auction date.
Finance Minister AMA Muhith chaired the meeting which was attended by the National Board of Revenue Chairman Md Nojibur Rahman, Telecommunications division secretary Md Faizur Rahman Chowdhury, Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission Chairman Sunil Kanti Bose, Chief Executive Officers of Grameenphone, Banglalink, Robi and Airtel.
SIM replacement tax claim is a long-disputed issue of about Tk2,000 crore, which has remained unresolved over the past three years, and the mobile operators said without solving the issue they will not sit in the spectrum auction.
In 2012, NBR claimed Tk3,060 crore as SIM replacement tax, and before 3G spectrum auction, a committee was formed with members from NBR and BTRC and operators’ representatives that recommended around Tk600 crore as tax.
But after the auction, NBR claimed much higher than the Tk600 crore and fixed the amount of tax at Tk2,468.88 crore with interest and Tk2,048 crore without interest.
In yesterday’s meeting, the finance minister asked the mobile phone operators to pay replacement tax without interest which he also wrote in a letter addressed to the NBR in February.
Muhith also asked the operators to withdraw the case regarding the SIM replacement tax and go for spectrum auction, sources said.
“The minister gave us directive in the meeting and it was positive. We hope the industry can run smoothly,” Md Faizur Rahman Chowdhury, secretary to Telecommunications Division, told the Dhaka Tribune after the meeting.
But the operators said they haven’t found anything positive in the meeting. Even the government high-ups are creating problems about the issue, added the operators.
