Telecom companies seek an urgent listing and hearing of the review petitions against the Supreme Court’s (SC) additional gross revenues (AGR) judgement. A team of counsels have mentioned this matter before Justice Arun Mishra-led bench. Justice Mishra-led bench was the very same bench that had given the AGR judgement back in May of 2019.

What is important to understand here is the urgency of it and this application was filed some time back but there has been no decision yet taken by either the Chief Justice of India (CJI) or Justice Arun Mishra-led bench.

Leave alone the AGR review application but also when they will hear the matter – there is no clarity and that clarity is urgently needed given that the deadline is due to run out in just a few days. January 23 is when the deadline runs out.

As far as Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea is concerned, together that figure stacks up to the north of Rs 50,000 crore. The deadline they have is January 23, 2020. That is the deadline proposed by the apex court and urgently they have sought a review of this.

What they have essentially got from today’s proceedings is that Justice Mishra has been given the notice that this issue needs to be resolved urgently, that request was made and he has responded by saying that he will consult the CJI on when this matter can be taken up and perhaps when one can expect more clarity on how perhaps this matter is to be heard and when it is to be heard and towards that end Justice Arun Mishra has directed all these parties to appear once again before the court tomorrow morning.

So expect to get clarity tomorrow morning at 10:30 am or at least some certainty on when this review application will be heard. This review application, of course, they are seeking to review the AGR judgement itself, they are seeking to review this judgement which in fact had cast this humongous liability upon them by essentially holding that non-telecom revenues are also a part of the AGR.

An important decision to be taken tomorrow morning. One will get clarity on when the SC proposes to take up this issue.