Irony dies a thousand deaths as Jio slams Trai's IUC review as ‘anti-poor’

Agencies
October 20, 2019

Mumbai, Oct 20: Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio has alleged that review of call connect charges by Trai "sabotages" the Prime Minister's vision for Digital India, and will hit not only the regulator's credibility but also investor confidence as the move protects vested interests of some old operators.

Continuing its relentless attack on the regulator and old operators over the contentious IUC (interconnect usage charge) issue that has polarised the industry, Jio alleged that Trai's move is arbitrary, bad in law, unwarranted, and anti-poor.

Any change in the implementation of the original timeline of January 1, 2020, will end the free voice regime and is likely to increase tariffs which are against consumer interest, Jio claimed.

Typically, a telecom operator pays for completing calls made by its subscribers to a rival network. This is done by paying the rival network an to interconnect usage charge, which currently is 6 paise per minute.

Trai's move to reopen the deadline for ending charges for terminating calls on rival networks beyond January 2020 had forced Jio to levy a 6 paisa per minute charge on its users recently, effectively ending its free call regime.

Submitting its official response to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) on the IUC matter, Jio alleged that "certain incumbent telcos" want their large body of 2G customers to forever remain digitally disempowered and deprived of the fruits of the digital revolution. Trai's consultation paper "protects and perpetuates the vested interests" of such players, it added.

Jio accused certain old operators of exploiting their 2G customers by charging "extortionist rates" for voice calls, which are offered free to all Jio's 4G-only customers.

"The Consultation Paper...undermines and sabotages Prime Minister's Digital India vision and mission," Jio said in its comment to Trai's consultation paper.

It is unfortunate that instead of profiting the poor and marginalised sections of Indian society, the consultation paper has chosen to help profiteers in the telecom business, Jio alleged.

The discussion paper wants India to remain technologically stagnant and backward, the company said.

The move contradicts the authority's past decisions where it was represented that the zero termination charge regime would come into effect for all types of calls from January 1, 2020, Jio said.

It added that the ongoing review, which violates the principles of regulatory predictability, has been initiated with pre-determined mind.

"...the present Consultation Paper has not been issued to address traffic asymmetry, but to address the claimed financial stress of one or two operators at the cost of the interests of the subscribers and the telecom sector, and also the credibility of the authority," it said.

The latest entrant, known for its disruptive tariffs, argued the present trend indicates that traffic asymmetry (one of the key reasons for Trai's rethink on IUC) is expected to be reversed in a few months and the present receivers will become payers, and so deferring stated timelines is not going to steer any operator away from the purported financial stress. Moving to zero termination charge regime will reduce overall tariffs for customers, Jio said.

Jio said that had Trai "recalculated termination charges, it would be less than 1 paise per minute at this stage", and added that the small residual value by itself fully justifies the need for moving to zero termination charge regime.

Jio cautioned that Trai's move will have a "chilling effect" on any new investments and future new entrants who will be deterred by this entry barrier, and even as the advanced world will move towards 5G, India will continue promoting 2G and keep millions of users out of Digital India.

"There exists no rationale for changing the date of implementation of BAK (bill and keep) regime from January 1, 2020," Jio added.

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News Network
January 2,2020

New Delhi, Jan 2: Thirteen firefighters were among the 14 people injured when a battery factory collapsed in northwest Delhi's Peera Garhi following an explosion due to a fire that broke out early on Thursday morning, officials said.

A fire brigade personnel still remained trapped under the debris of the building in Udyog Nagar area, an official said.

A large portion of the two-storey building collapsed following an explosion when firefighters were dousing the blaze, the official said, adding that fire department had received a call at 4.23am.

Plumes of smoke billowed out from the building as the fire brigade personnel battled to contain the blaze. An eyewitness said several explosions were heard as the blaze gutted down the building.

The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and civil authorities rushed to the spot to control the situation, an official said, adding that 35 fire tenders were at the spot.

The injured, including a security guard of the factory, were rushed to nearby hospitals, a police officer said.

Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said he was monitoring the situation.

"V sad to hear this. Am closely monitoring the situation. Fire personnel trying their best. Praying for the safety of those trapped," Kejriwal tweeted.

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News Network
June 25,2020

Ottawa, Jun 25: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took his son out for ice cream on Wednesday in his first family outing since Canada started easing out of its pandemic lockdown.

It was also Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day in Quebec province.

Wearing masks, the Canadian leader and his six-year-old son Hadrien were cheered at Chocolats Favoris in Gatineau, Quebec.

According to a pool report, Trudeau said the shop tapped into a federal emergency wage subsidy and business loan in order to weather the pandemic, and "avoid being frozen out of the frozen treat market."

Hadrien is said to have bounced with excitement, settling on a vanilla cone with a cookie topping while dad bought a vanilla cone dipped in chocolate for himself.

Father and son then headed out to the patio, where they doffed their masks to eat their cones.

Canada's provinces and territories declared states of emergency mid-March, closing schools and non-essential businesses in response to the pandemic.

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Agencies
May 26,2020

New Delhi, May 26: As India ranked 10th in the global infection list, overtaking Iran, which was an early hotspot of coronavirus, India's top medical body has said the human trials of COVID-19 vaccine may begin at least in six months.

Dr. Rajni Kant, Director Regional Medical Research Centre and Head at the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) said, "The virus strain isolated at the National Institute of Virology (NIV) laboratory in Pune will be used to develop the vaccine, and this strain has been successfully transferred to the Bharat Biotech International Ltd. (BBIL). It is expected that the human trials of the vaccine will begin in at least six months."

Queried on the focus areas as India inches closer to 1.4 lakh COVID-19 cases, Kant said we should not get anxious about the rapid increase in numbers, especially in the past week, which saw 5,000 Covid-19 cases daily, instead focus on protecting the most vulnerable group.

"We should not fear from increasing Covid-19 cases. The elderly and people with comorbidities need protection. This is the highly vulnerable group, and we need to deploy resources and develop strategies to keep the mortality rate as low as possible in this group," said Kant.

Initially, it was assumed that the country would require thousands of ventilators, but last week, the health ministry said only 0.45 per cent of COVID-19 cases need ventilator support.

Kant insisted the focus should be on five per cent to 10 per cent serious patients. "We are testing more than one lakh daily and our case fatality rate is already one of the lowest in the world. In absence of vaccine, people should follow social distancing guidelines," he added

On the significance of the recovery rate, Kant said the increasing recovery rate of the COVID-19 patients, which is at 41 per cent, is a bright spot in India's fight against deadly viral infection.

Queried on large scale COVID-19 cases in Mumbai, Delhi and Ahmedabad, Kant said the population density in these regions is very high, which proves to be the just right environment for the viral infection.

He insisted on developing robust cluster management strategies in the hard-hit coronavirus spots, and the movement of people should be curtailed in these areas.

"Currently, a lot of people are moving around easily and avoiding social distancing norms. The first phase of the lockdown was very effective, but now things have changed," added Kant.

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