'TRAI's BW regulations pose threat'

VSNL Chairman Subodh Bhargava on Wednesday said there was possibility of "risks of sickness of Indian enterprises and job losses" if the regulator specifies ceilings, which would force international bandwidth providers to sell international bandwidth at a loss.

"We share the vision of lower tariffs for customers. In fact, VSNL has led several tariff reductions in all our business segments. However, any regulation or market competition driven initiatives that reduce tariffs to a level making services unviable, has to be avoided", he said addressing the shareholders at the 19th Annual General Meeting of the company.

Bhargava also indicated that the company has endeavoured to reduce the prices of International bandwidth and have succeeded in lowering the prices by 90 per cent in the last 4 years.

VSNL officials expressed the comparison between the prices prevailing in trans-Atlantic and trans-pacific geographies with the Indian market as unfair, as almost every cable asset in those routes have undergone Chapter 11 (Bankruptcy protection) proceedings and were later sold at dirt cheap prices to new owners who are operating those cable systems.

Expressing concerns on the artificial price regulations, Bhargava stated in his speech, "there is a risk of job loss and the potential sickness of Indian enterprises, making them easy pick for foreign companies".

VSNL officials pointed that the cable assets in trans-Atlantic and trans-pacific have been sold at 5 per cent of the cost at which these assets were built due to sheer over-capacity.

First Published: Sep 29, 2005 19:13 IST