The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) is currently investigating charges of predatory pricing and violation of tariff rules against Reliance Jio. The accusations have been made by representatives of Bharti Airtel, Vodafone India, Idea Cellular, and Telenor India.
TRAI chairman RS Sharma had summoned the aforementioned telecom operators for a meeting on September 30 to discuss the issue of Points of Interconnection (PoI) that is causing discontent in a segment already affected by a price war. PoI is essential for executing calls between two networks.
Reliance Jio had accused its competitors in the telecom sector of not granting enough interconnection points for its calls, resulting in massive call drops on the network. It had formally lodged a complaint with TRAI about the same and the regulatory body decided to summon the existing players and the Mukesh-Ambani led company to sort the issue.
The substantial amount of call drops and TRAI’s concern of the customer being affected by the price war caused the authority to issue a notice to the established telcos stating that they would be fined if the necessary infrastructure was not provided to Jio. This warning was challenged by the companies which asserted that Jio is violating tariff order regulations by offering free calls on its network.
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Jio has announced that it will offer free voice calls for life and is currently handing out services without any cost till December 31. Operators like Vodafone, Airtel and Idea are objecting to this policy as it is threatening their respective businesses. They have stated that such practices are unfair and breaches the rules set by TRAI.
These accusations by the existing players have resulted in TRAI carrying out investigations to find out if Jio is indeed infringing rules. According to reports, the matter will take a week to look into and the regulatory body will give its verdict as soon as it is done with the inspection.