The corporate has 20 crore customers, and any resolution on the corporate would have an effect on the purchasers too
Vodafone-Thought gained a significant reduction within the Supreme Courtroom on Monday after the Union Authorities agreed to rethink its demand for added adjusted gross income (AGR) dues from the corporate and take an applicable resolution in accordance with the regulation.
Showing earlier than a bench headed by Chief Justice of India BR Gavai, Solicitor Normal Tushar Mehta, for the Centre, mentioned there was a “large change in circumstances” within the time between earlier AGR litigation within the prime court docket involving Vodafone-Thought (VI) and the current one.
Mehta submitted that the federal government has infused a “substantial fairness” to the tune of 49 per cent within the firm.
“Thus the federal government’s curiosity, which is the general public’s personal curiosity, is interlinked with the corporate now,” the highest regulation officer submitted.
Over-invoicing
He additional briefed the court docket that the corporate has 20 crore customers, and any resolution on the corporate would have an effect on the purchasers too. He mentioned the federal government had considerations like over-invoicing, and many others, related to the corporate, however that will be comprehensively heard and thought of intimately.
The court docket mentioned the problem has entered into the “coverage area” with the federal government pumping in appreciable fairness and the problem involving 20 crore clients of the corporate.
The court docket discovered nothing improper within the authorities’s stand to rethink its demand for added AGR dues for the monetary yr (FY) 2016-2017 from the corporate and take an appropriate resolution, saying this could additionally tackle the bigger public curiosity concerned.
VI had approached the apex court docket in opposition to the extra AGR demand raised by the Division of Telecommunication (DoT) for the 2016-2017 interval. The corporate had argued that the liabilities had been already calculated, and couldn’t be modified or elevated.
It had urged the court docket to quash the extra DoT demand whereas searching for a complete re-assessment and reconciliation of AGR dues for the interval until FY 2016-17.
Recent litigation
The recent litigation had come solely months after the apex court docket had rejected earlier petitions by Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Thought (VI) and Tata Teleservices searching for reduction within the fee of their curiosity on the dues, penalty and curiosity on the penalty in direction of their respective AGR liabilities on the bottom that they had been underneath extreme monetary constraints.
The apex court docket had, in its order in Might, concluded their pleas to be “misconceived”.
In actual fact, the Chief Justice had voiced the necessity for finality within the AGR litigation.
Greater than a yr in the past, on September 19, the apex court docket had dismissed a healing petition filed by telcos, together with Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Thought, in opposition to the court docket’s October 2019 judgement upholding the DoT’s transfer to get better AGR of about ₹92,000 crore from them.
Printed on October 27, 2025
