Bharti Airtel has prepaid Rs. 8,024 crores to the Department of Telecom (DoT) towards part prepayment of deferred liabilities pertaining to spectrum acquired in auction of year 2015, the company said in a stock exchange filing on Monday.
The said instalments had an interest rate of 10 percent and have been prepaid by Airtel, leveraging much lower cost financing available to it, the company said.
Deferred spectrum liabilities are dues owned by telecom operators to the government for airwaves bought in previous years. These are paid over installments.
They are separate from Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) liabilities which are the usage and licensing fees that telecom operators are charged by the government.
The three private sector telecom operators – Bharti Airtel, Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea – together owe spectrum dues worth a whopping Rs. 3.78 Trillion, to be paid over annual instalments starting from FY23-24 till FY38-39, the Lok Sabha was informed last year.
“Airtel continues to enjoy access to a well-diversified sources of capital/financing, allowing it to have enhanced financial flexibility in its capital structure including optimised cost of financing using all opportunities for significant interest savings, like this prepayment,” the company stressed in its press release.
Last year, the company had cleared Rs 24,334 crore of liabilities ahead of scheduled maturities. In 2021, Airtel had prepaid Rs 15,519 crore, clearing all dues relating to airwaves bought in the 2014 sale.
Meanwhile, Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio last year paid Rs 30,791 crore towards dues on all spectrum purchased before March 2021. This included accrued interest for spectrum purchased in 2014-2016 and spectrum acquired through a right-to-use agreement with Airtel in 2021.
The government considers the payment of deferred spectrum liabilities to make up for a large chunk of the telecom sector revenue in the current year.