Nick Reed, CEO of Vodafone Idea's promoter British company Vodafone, met Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Communications Minister Ravi Shankar on the AGR issue on Friday. Simultaneously, Reid sought relief before both ministers, expressing the company's inability to pay the dues as per the Supreme Court verdict. According to the company's internal assessment, Vodafone Idea owes only 21,533 crore of AGR from 2006 to February 2019. It has an interest and penalty of Rs 6,854 crore of principal.

Let us tell you that only AGR or Adjusted Gross Revenue is considered in computing license fees. Not in spectrum usage charge. Along with this, arrears of more than 1.47 lakhs on telecom companies, along with license fees and spectrum usage charge (SUC), the interest and penalty payable on them. After meeting Finance Minister Sitharaman, Reid said that any relief package for the company would be announced by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT). He refused to divulge further details. After meeting Sitharaman, Reed also held a meeting with Communications Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad and Communications Secretary Anshu Prakash, along with Vodafone Idea MD and CEO Ravinder Bumpka.

According to sources there too, both of them placed a demand for relief to the company. At the same time, there is a demand for the facility of repaying the amount of dues in installments during 15 years. A day before these meetings, it was said by Vodafone Idea that it has assessed the AGR (license fee) dues of only Rs 21,533 crore in internal audits. When the Supreme Court got the idea of this, on February 14, it took strict action against both the government and the telecom companies, issuing all the arrears till February 24, and ordered to be ready for contempt action. Fearing, the DoT immediately withdrew its order and asked the telecom companies to deposit the arrears by midnight or prepare them for action.

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