A vested quarter is reportedly trying to manage the government to make international incoming call rate half from the existing US$ 3.0 cents in order to protect the interest of some companies, especially those allegedly involved with the illegal VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) business.
Sources said an influential group including some ministers is working closely behind the matter despite knowing the fact that it will cause the government to incur a large amount of revenue loss, which was estimated by the telecom regulator earlier to be around Tk 11 billion.
Sensing the possible big loss, the finance minister had rejected twice the proposal of the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) to halve the call rate.
Having failed to manage approval from the finance ministry, the section has sought revision of the proposal on the revenue earning issue and is lobbying in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) to make their effort successful. Now the file relating to call reduction proposal is waiting in the PMO, sources at the telecom ministry said.
There are 29 licensees for termination of international incoming calls, of which currently 18 operators are active and operation of the rest was mainly suspended.
According to the current proposal, BTRC's revenue sharing will be brought down to 40 per cent from 51.75 per cent and per call rate will be 1.5 cents instead of 3.0 cents.
The BTRC proposal claimed that the government is now annually earning around Tk 18.51 billion from this sector, with a daily average of 35 million minutes of incoming calls.
Although the regulator in its previous proposal claimed that the government would be able to earn only about Tk 7.70 billion every year if the rate was reduced to $ 1.5 cents per minute, it is now claiming that the earning will be Tk 20.13 billion with the increase in call volume.
BTRC statistics showed that in February, total incoming calls were 1.54 billion minutes and the daily average was 55 million minutes. In March it was 59 million minutes per day and in April it was 57 million minutes a day on an average.
BTRC's recommendation also claimed that neighbouring countries' call termination rates are much lower than Bangladesh's, but the information is false according to the industry insiders.
According to the data of VoIP Service Providers Association (VSPA), the call termination rates in neighbouring countries are three to eight times higher than that of Bangladesh.
Per minute international call termination rate is 9 US cents in Sri Lanka, 9.5 cents in Nepal, 8.8 cents in Pakistan and 25 cents in the Maldives, which is the highest, said VSPA Convener Rabiul Karim.
Only the Indian call termination rate is lower than that of Bangladesh, but their termination pattern is different from Bangladesh's, sources said.
Vested quarter out to get int\\\'l incoming call rate halved
FE Report | Published: July 20, 2014 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2026 06:01:00
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