Basic operators to pay higher routing charges
New Delhi—The Bharat Sanchar Nigam, BSNL, has told private basic telecom operators that they would have to give a higher share of revenues from calls originating from their networks and travelling over the BSNL network.
This means that the revenues of the private basic telecom operators could go down by as much as 50 per cent if the new interconnection charges proposed by BSNL are implemented.
Hence, the Association of Basic Telecom Operators is protesting and has approached the telecom regulatory authority of India seeking its intervention.
As per the existing arrangement, the basic telecom operators get 60 per cent of the total revenue for the STD calls originating from their networks.
The remaining 40 per cent goes to BSNL. For ISD calls originating from their networks, private operators get 45 per cent and BSNL gets 55 per cent of the revenue.
But for local calls originating from their networks private operators retain 100 per cent revenue. And they don’t get anything for the calls originating from BSNL’s network and terminating at their networks.
This has been the system since May 1, 1999, following TRAI’s Telecommunication Interconnection Regulation, 1999.
The new system proposed by BSNL says that private operators can keep only 30 per cent of the STD revenue for the calls originating from their networks, while BSNL would corner the remaining 70 per cent. For ISD Calls originating from private networks, BSNL wants 80 per cent of the total revenue, leaving 20 per cent for the private operators. For local calls originating from the private networks, BSNL wants 50 per cent of the total revenue.
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Private cells jammed as WLL trials begin
Mumbai—As BSNL and MTNL begin trials for the CDMA-based wireless-in-local-loop service top cell operators in India are facing interference in their mobile signals from radio frequencies emanating out of an adjacent frequency band of MTNL and BSNL.

The badly affected operators include Hutchison Max’s Orange in Mumbai, Fascel in Gujarat, Tata Cellular in Andhra Pradesh and BPL in Maharashtra and these have already taken up the issue with the Wireless Planning Commission and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India though no solution has been found to the problem.

If the problem is not addressed quickly, it could seriously affect operations of some of the leading cellular operators and hurt subscribers.
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DPC lenders to resume talks today in Singapore
Mumbai—Representatives of IDBI, ICICI, State Bank of India (SBI) met on Tuesday to chalk out the strategy at the two-day meeting with offshore lenders and Enron officials.
The Indian team was led by Mr RS Agarwal, the IDBI executive director, along with the other officials from other lending institutions including those from the SBI and ICICI.
Apparently, the domestic FIs, revived their efforts to convince DPC’s offshore lenders to maintain "restraint" to save the Dabhol project.
The foreign lenders are expected to take a clear stand on Wednesday.
Enron India managing director K Wade Cline and DPC president Neil McGregor are likely to participate in the second day of the meeting. The meeting was also attended by a consortium led by ABN-Amro, Citibank NA, Japan Exim Bank and OPIC.
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Bank unions stir over pension to intensify
Kolkata—The United Forum of Bank Unions, UFBU, which is an association of nine trade unions operating in the banking industry, says it will intensify its stir against the managements unless the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) comes to any final settlement regarding the pension scheme for employees.

An UFBU spokesman said that even after two rounds of wage negotiations between the IBA and the unions, there had not been any significant upward revision in the pension scheme for public sector commercial banks, even though the Central Government had hiked the pension for its employees by a good percentage following the Fifth Pay Commission recommendations.
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