New consultation paper on IUC review bad law: Jio to Trai

TIL Desk/Business/New Delhi/ Reliance Jio has hit out at the telecom regulator Trai for issuing a fresh consultation paper on seeking opinion of industry on the extension of existing Interconnect usage charge (IUC) regime beyond 2020.

In its response to the Trai discussion paper on the same last month, Jio said, “the consultation paper aids and abets sabotage of the Prime Minister’s Digital India mission because it protects and perpetuates the vested interests of certain incumbent telecom operators who do want their large body of 2G customers to forever remain digitally disempowered and deprived of the fruits of the digital revolution.”

“These 2G customers, who belong to the under-privileged section of India’s population, have been excluded from Digital Infrastructure, it said.

It said incumbent telcos are deliberately not ending the outdated 2G networks and Trai is helping them. Trai in September issued a new consultation paper seeking change of time period in going for zero IUC citing imbalance traffic in telecom networks.