On February 10, 2020, CCI dismissed an allegation by Mr. Ajinder Singh, on behalf of Teleclub Alberta Limited (‘Informant’) claiming that Vodafone Idea Limited (‘Vodafone’), Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited (‘Reliance’), Airtel Limited (‘Airtel’) and Sify Technologies (‘Sify’) acted in violation of Sections 3 and 4 of the Act.  Vodafone, Reliance, Airtel and Sify are together referred to as ‘Telcos’[1].

The Informant had filed the information on behalf of Teleclub (Alberta Limited) in his capacity as its CEO. Teleclub is an international telecom carrier in Canada. Vodafone is an Indian subsidiary of Britain based Vodafone Group PLC, which started Indian operations in 2007 with the acquisition of controlling interest in Hutch Essar. In 2018, Vodafone acquired Idea Cellular and became the largest telecom service provider in India. Likewise, Reliance and Airtel are also major telecom service providers operating in India. Further, as per publicly available information, Sify is the largest Information and Communications Technology (‘ICT’) service provider, systems integrator and all-in-one network solutions company operating in India, which has partnered with major network operators to deliver global network solutions.

The Informant entered into an agreement with Idea Cellular (now acquired by Vodafone) to provide inbound calls to India at the rate of INR 0.37 per minute through Idea Cellular’s network for which a Master Agreement was signed and executed between the Informant and Idea Cellular in November 2017. Subsequently, an amendment to the Master Agreement was executed between the Informant and Idea Cellular (now acquired by Vodafone) in April 2018.

The Informant alleged that during the course of business, the Telcos held a conference in Hawaii, United States and decided to charge standard rate of 0.0053 USD for inbound calls terminating on their network in India, instead of the rates fixed by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India’s (‘TRAI’) notifications i.e., INR 0.30 per minute. The Informant had no option but to agree to these terms, as all telecom operators provided the same rate. The telecom operators further increased the rate of inbound calls to 0.0115 USD per minute after another meeting in February 2018, and the same was telephonically communicated to the Informant. The Informant alleges that the telecom operators also harassed the Informant by choking its ports used for sending traffic.

CCI observed that the allegation related to charging rates above those fixed by the TRAI, and fell within TRAI’s jurisdiction. Accordingly, CCI sought TRAI’s opinion on two issues: (i) whether the service providers (Telcos) can be said to have contravened the provisions of IUC Regulations, 2018 by charging higher termination charges for inbound international calls, terminating into India?; and (ii) whether any complaint has been filed with TRAI in this regard?

In its response, TRAI explained that the Interconnection Usage Charges (IUC) Regulations, 2018 prescribe the International Termination Charges (‘ITC’) for international incoming calls to wireline and wireless networks at INR 0.30 per minute. The International Settlement Charge (‘ISC’) has not been regulated under the IUC Regulations, 2018 and is supposed to be decided by mutual negotiations between the Indian Long Distance Operators (‘ILDOs’) and foreign service providers. No Indian Long Distance (‘ILD’) license was issued by the Department of Telecom (‘DoT’) in the name of the Informant. According to TRAI, the Informant is in the business of providing services in the capacity of a foreign service provider and, thus, has to negotiate with the ILDOs for deciding ISC for inbound international calls terminating in India. TRAI further clarified that the Telcos in the present case had not contravened the IUC Regulations, 2018. Responding to the second question posed by CCI, TRAI stated no complaint was filed with TRAI in this regard till that date.

In light of the categorical opinion received from the sectoral regulator, CCI dismissed the information and observed that the parties are well within their legal rights to negotiate the terms and conditions for doing business inter-se, while not violating the principles of competition law.

[1] Case No. 32 of 2019