#Breaking: Will TRAI put a stop to Reliance Jio free promotional offers?

The counsel for Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), Kirtiman Singh on Wednesday told the Delhi High Court that TRAI has taken a decision regarding the legality of the free promotional offers introduced by Reliance Jio..The counsel informed the bench of Sanjeev Sachdeva, J. that it was the Telecom Disputes Settlement Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) that has directed TRAI to file its decision on free tariff plans of Reliance Jio by Thursday. Singh also told the bench that the TRAI’s decision is “ready” but “has not been made public yet”..This submission by TRAI came during the hearing of the Vodafone petition. Vodafone has filed a petition seeking a writ of mandamus against TRAI’s “blatant violation” of its tariff orders by permitting Reliance Jio to continue with its free promotional offers..TDSAT’s direction results out of a plea filed by Bharti Airtel and Idea alleging inaction by TRAI for Reliance Jio’s violation of the tariff orders and regulations. Vodafone filed a similar petition on the same issue in the Delhi High Court, instead..The bench observed that a decision by TRAI on the issues mentioned in the petition may make the petition infructuous, in which case no hearing would be required. Justice Sachdeva told Senior Counsel Dayan Krishnan representing Vodafone,.“Let me be very candid with you here. I don’t want to get into a discussion for over three hours if tomorrow the entire petition is going to become infructuous. Whereas, if you are not satisfied by the said decision, you can always challenge it.”.In response to which Krishnan stated,.“In that case, let me also be candid with your lordship. I don’t want to be a hostage to TRAI’s decision because my petition is about so much more than just the issues they say they have dealt with.”.Reaching an amicable decision, the bench simply posted the matter for February 6, when the arguments will be heard if the much-awaited TRAI decision does not render the matter infructuous..In the previous hearing, Vodafone, through counsel Manjul Bajpai, had argued that TRAI had failed to implement the circulars of the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), which stated that all tariffs must be compliant with Interconnection Usage Charges (IUC) regulations on a non-predatory and non-discriminatory basis..Vodafone had further claimed that due to TRAI’s arbitrary and irregular actions, Reliance Jio, in the garb of “test service”, has amassed millions of subscribers by offering them free services. Due to this, service providers like Airtel, Idea and Vodafone were facing huge losses on a daily basis..Senior Advocate Ramji Srinivasan appeared for Reliance Jio in the matter. Reliance was impleaded after Justice Sachdeva had held that the result of the petition would directly affect Reliance Jio..Now, whether TRAI’s decision comes as a relief to the market leaders or ends up being another way of skirting around the issues amidst all the pending litigation remains to be seen.