Double relief for Vi on AGR dues, legacy income tax case

Back-to-back reliefs lift Vodafone Idea's stock nearly 10% amid hopes of regulatory reprieve

- Krishna Yadav, Jatin Grover & Devina Sengupta

In a double dose of relief for Vodafone Idea on Monday, the Supreme Court and the Income Tax Department moved to give succour on two separate, long-running disputes.

First, the IT department withdrew a ₹8,500-crore transfer pricing case against Vodafone India Services Pvt. Ltd .- in the Supreme Court. The commissioner of income tax filed a plea to drop the case before a bench led by chiefjustice B.R. Gavai, which permitted the department to do so.

Vodafone India and Idea Cellular completed their merger in 2018 to form Vodafone Idea (Vi).

According to the SC's website, the matter was pending since 2016 and was last listed for hearing in April 2017, but had seen no progress since then.

A few hours later, the apex court clarified that the Centre could reassess all of Vi's adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues as of fiscal year 2017 (FY17)- including interest and penalties-clarifying an earlier order where it was not clear whether the relief was sought for only additional AGR dues pending up to FY17 all AGR dues.

AGR is the income figure used to calculate the licence fees and spectrum charges that telecom companies must pay the government.