Telcos owe govt Tk 13,068cr

The mobile phone operators owe Tk 13,068 crore to the government, Telecom Minister Mustafa Jabbar told the parliament yesterday.

Of the amount, Grameenphone owes Tk 10,580 crore and state-owned Teletalk Tk 1,631 crore.

The minister shared the information in response to a query from Jatiya Party Lawmaker Syed Abu Hossain Babla.

The minister said the amount of Grameenphone's audit objection is around Tk 12,579 crore and it has so far paid Tk 2,000 crore to the government.

In a scripted answer, the minister said, the amount of Robi Axiata's audit objection is around Tk 867 crore.

Of the amount, Robi has cleared Tk 138 crore and now its arrear stands at Tk 729 crore.

The minister also informed the House that Citycell owes around Tk 128 crore to the government.

Cases were pending in the Supreme Court over the arrears of Grameenphone, Robi and Citycell, Jabbar said.

In 2012, Bangladesh had 8.66 crore mobile subscribers, which has crossed over 18.34 crore this year, the telecom minister said in response to another query from Awami League Lawmaker Nazrul Islam Babu.

The country now has 3.19 crore 3G subscribers and 7.54 crore 4G users, Jabbar said.

The number of Bangladesh's internet subscribers was 2.89 crore in 2012, which is now hovering around 12.42 crore, he said.

The country's teledensity—the number of telephone connections per 100 people in a specified geographic area—is now 105.85 per cent, which was 60.9 per cent 10 years ago.