On Thursday, the Vodafone Idea stock had tanked over 17 per cent on the NSE after the cash strapped telecom operators board had accepted Kumar Mangalam Birla’s request to step down as the non-executive chairman and non-executive director.
The stock was under pressure after Birla had offered to hand over his stake in the company to the government. In the past three trading sessions, the stocks of the company had slumped over 40 per cent.
Vodafone had tried many ways to relieve themselves of their financial stress but nothing had worked so far and they would be a matter of time away from filing for bankruptcy at the NCLT.
Birla in his letter to the government in June said that investors were not willing to invest in their company in the absence of clarity on the AGR liability, and an adequate moratorium on spectrum payments and pricing regime above the cost of service.
Vodafone Idea was owing over Rs 58,000 crore of AGR dues. In the previous month, the Supreme Court of India had rejected pleas by the telecom companies which allegedly had errors in the calculation of adjusted gross revenue related dues. Airtel and Jio would benefit from the exit of Vodafone.
As shown by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, Vodafone had over 277.6 million wireless subscribers as of May 31. Vodafone Plc had offered their stake for free to lenders and the public sector telecom company, BSNL.
If there are significant changes made in the telecom policy by the government then it might be possible that the investors might be interested in infusing funds and then the bankruptcy filing could be avoided.
