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The CAG found that six mobile operators had underreported revenues of nearly Rs 46,000, causing a nearly Rs 12,500 crore loss to the government.
Updated : Mar 22, 2018, 02:08 AM IST
The shares of mobile operators slumped on the BSE on Friday after the Department of Tax said it was in the process of slapping six telecom operators with a Rs 12,500 crore tax notice for underreporting revenue of Rs 46,000 crore.
An investigation by the government's auditor found that six telecom operators -- Bharti Airtel, vodafone India, Aircel, Reliance Communications, Tata Teleservices and Idea Cellular -- had understated revenue of up to Rs 46,000 crore in the four years from 2006-07 to 2009-10.
On Friday, the shares of Idea Cellular were down 3.05% at Rs 101.70 per share, slightly up than the day's low of Rs 100.55. The shares of Bharti Airtel were down 2.37% at Rs 354.70, Tata Communications was down at Rs 478.50, down 1.01% and Reliance Communications was down 2%.
"The DoT is in the process to issue demand notice of over Rs 12,500 crore to six telecom operators – RCom, Tata Tele, Vodafone, Airtel, Idea and Aircel – which the CAG has found to have under-reported revenues during the UPA regime," a telecom ministry official, was quoted in a PTI report.
The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) in a report tabled in Parliament in March said these six companies under-reported their adjusted gross revenue (AGR) by Rs 46,045.75 crore, leading to a loss of Rs 12,488.93 crore to the exchequer from 2006 to 2010, the report said.
The auditor reported instances of under reporting of revenue due to netting off of discounts/waivers granted to post-paid subscribers and under-invoicing of roaming revenue due to set-off of inter-operator traffic discounts paid to other operators. Also, there was under-reporting of revenue from infrastructure sharing with other telecom operators as well as from forex gain, the PTI report said.
(With inputs from PTI)