The Supreme Court has issued notices to the Indian government, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and Reliance Industries' data services venture Reliance Jio Infocomm (RJIL) over the government's decision to allow RJIL to offer voice services on its 4G spectrum, reports The Times Of India. The apex court has apparently sought a response from the government and TRAI on the PIL (Public Interest Litigation) filed by the lawyer and senior Aam Aadmi Party leader Prashant Bhushan which had challenged the government's decision to allow 4G players offer voice calls services on their network by paying an additional fee of Rs 1,658 crore. Bhushan claimed that through this move, the government had violated the Supreme Court's February 2012 judgement by providing a backdoor entry to Reliance Jio Infocomm to offer voice telephony services without auction at the price determined way back in 2001. He notes that this price was rejected by the Supreme Court in its February 2012 judgement which had cancelled 122 2G licenses issued to nine telecom operators. It's worth noting that Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) had also raised similar allegations in March 2013, claiming that telecom department had proposed these policy changes to give undue benefits to RIL and the unified license regime should not be used to provide a backdoor entry for BWA players to offer voice services. The Indian government however had dismissed these allegations later. While we are yet to receive a response from Reliance Industries, the company had informed BSE (pdf) on Friday that it is yet to receive notice of any petition filed by Prashant…
