Citycell won't shut until Sep 16: court

Moribund mobile operator Citycell got some breathing space after a High Court bench yesterday asked the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission not to shut down its operations until September 16.

The government had planned to bring down the curtains on Citycell's operations on August 24 after the operator failed to clear dues amounting to Tk 477.63 crore.

"It's a relief for us," said Mehboob Chowdhury, chief executive officer of Citycell, adding that the operator will work to clear its dues within this time.

The court order came during the hearing of China Development Bank's petition to realise its dues of $36.63 million from Citycell.

During the hearing Citycell's lawyer filed an application to prevent the telecom regulator from shutting down its operation, said Barrister Khandaker Reza-E-Raquib, a lawyer for the BTRC.

In its application, Citycell said the BTRC gave it only 6.6 Megahertz spectrum after it renewed its licence for another 15 years in 2011. It has already paid for 5 Megahertz of the spectrum, according to a senior Citycell official.

Citycell started operations in 1993 using the CDMA technology, which has since been superseded by the GSM technology that the other operators in Bangladesh use.

As a result, the operator has ceased to be a significant player in the market for at least 10 years now, with its current subscriber base being in the neighbourhood of 1.50 lakh. At present, the number of the country's total active mobile connections is 13.14 crore.

Citycell had applied to the BTRC to switch to the GSM technology but it was declined owing to the operator's heaping dues.

It did not pay the second and third instalments -- amounting to Tk 229 crore -- of its spectrum renewal fees, which were due in 2012.

Besides, it owes annual spectrum fees totalling Tk 27.14 crore from 2013 to 2016; revenue sharing proceeds of Tk 27.84 crore from 2014 to 2016; social obligatory fund contributions of Tk 8.92 crore from 2011 to 2016; value-added taxes of Tk 39.92 crore; and Tk 135 crore in penalty.

"As the regulator didn't resolve our spectrum issues and didn't allow us to change our technology, we can't find possible investors. So we placed the issue before the court," the official added.