‘Tougher measures to realise outstanding money from mobile operators’

Posts and Telecommunications Minister Mustafa Jabbar today told parliament that the government will take tougher measures to realise outstanding money from different private mobile phone operators after completing audit to calculate the government’s dues.

“The audits over two operators (Grameenphone and Robi) have already been conducted and the audit over others will also be carried out. Severer measures will be taken to realize the outstanding (from the operators),” he said in reply to a supplementary question from Jatiya Party MP Mujibul Haque (Kishoreganj-3).

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The minister said whenever the government moved to take initiatives to realise the outstanding money from any mobile operator, the process get delayed as the operator go to the court.

“This is why the outstanding money has remained unrealised for long,” he said.

Pointing that the government has outstanding money from the two mobile phone operators – GP and Robi, the minister said different measures including slashing 30 per cent bandwidth capacity of GP and 15 per cent of Robi, were taken as part of the government’s move to realize dues from them.

Mustafa also informed the House that total outstanding from GP is Tk 12,800 crore.

He said the government faces crises in some cases if it goes to take any tough measure against the mobile phone operators to realize the outstanding from them.

For example, the minister said if the government cancels the license of GP, the people will ultimately suffer.

“This is why we’re to think of taking stern action considering the matter of the people,” he added.