Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) has allegedly been putting pressure on the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications (MoPT) for authorising a private land phone operator with a retrospective permit, sources at the ministry said.
Bangla Phone, the private land phone operator (PSTN), has been operating a NTTN (Nationwide Telecommunication Transmission Network) on the basis of a permit – without proper licensing since 2011, despite several MoPT warnings.
On August 7, the government had last asked the BTRC to take legal actions against the company, for operating without a NTTN licence.
However, BTRC sent aletter to the ministry seeking a retrospective permit for the company, effective from 2011.
“License provisions for NTTN does not have any number restrictions, but the permit issued by the regulator is totally illegal, and now they are trying to legalise it,” Barrister Aneek R Haque, who had fought a legal battle for BTRC back in 2008 against Bangla Phone, told the Dhaka Tribune.
In the letter, BTRC informed the government that since October 22, 2011, it extended Bangla Phone’s permit five times and the next renewal was fixed for April 2014.
The telecom watchdog said as Bangla Phone have some business contracts with other companies, their permit can be approved.
Barrister Aneek R Haque, however, said: “As Bangla Phone is a land phone (PSTN) operator they are neither eligible for NTTN licence nor qualified for the permit. It is totally unlawful and violates the existing guideline.”
“As per the Telecom Acts’ section 40, it is the government’s responsibility to approve any permit for establishing a telecommunications network.”
This meant, Bangla Phone has not been required to pay NTTN licence fee worth Tk30m and annual fees of Tk2.5m, as it does not have a proper licence.
Meanwhile, Amjad Khan, managing director and CEO of Bangla Phone, told the Dhaka Tribune: “We are creating a network and the government should give us the permission to work. People in many areas would not have got internet access at a minimum rate if not for us.”
Earlier,in 2008, BTRC had directed Bangla Phoneto not to lay fibre but it took BTRC to the court and lost the case. The court had fined Bangla Phone Tk5,000 for wasting valuable time of the court.
After the change of the government, however, Bangla Phone managed a permit in 2011, bypassing the telecom law and has been running its business since.
According to the BTRC’s records, Bangla Phoneas a zonal operator has seven annual fees and revenue sharing for 21 quarters outstanding.
On its website, Bangla Phone claimed to have got permission to operate land lines in the northeast zone on June 22, 2004.
However, it claimed to be a transmission network service provider with 16 districts under its network.
