Tata Teleservices on Friday termed as “cheap gimmick” allegations by Rajya Sabha MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar that Tata benefited from policy flip flops and the role of former Trai head Pradeep Baijal in it. Tata Teleservices also said that it will not be responding to further statements from Mr Chandrasekhar as the Supreme Court has
already ordered an investigation in the 2G scam and there is no merit in keeping this issue alive any further. “We find the debate created by him (Mr Chandrasekhar) to be futile,” said Tata Teleservices.
In a statement on Thursday, Mr Chandrasekhar had pointed out as to how after his retirement as Trai chairman Mr Baijal “consults for Tata group”. Mr Baijal is already under the CBI scanner for his role as Trai chairman. In its response Tata Teleservices said that Mr Baijal had limited powers as the head of Trai. “The role of Trai is to make recommendations and it is entirely up to the telecom department, which is the final decision-maker, to accept the recommendations or not to accept them,” said the company. It further said that Mr Baijal’s recommendation in favour of universal access service licence was a generic recommendation in favour of a technology agnostic telecom policy and not something specific to Tata Teleservices.
“Tata Teleservices finds the statement linking a former regulator whose powers were only to make non-binding recommendations, insinuating that he granted huge benefits to Tata Tele — this is nothing but a cheap gimmick,” the statement added.
Tata and Mr Chandrasekhar have been involved in a war of words after the latter wrote an open letter alleging that Tata benefited from policy changes. Mr Ratan Tata had alleged that Mr Chandrasekhar was making these statements because he was close to a political party which wanted to embarrass Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Tata Teleservices said that the real beneficiaries of telecom department’s inconsistent and arbitrary policies were incumbent GSM operators who were issued 48 GSM licences and allocated 65 MHz of additional spectrum free of charge, beyond the contracted spectrum, between 2004 and 2008.