Airtel's Q2 profit dips 38% on SC's licence fee ruling

Bharti Airtel Ltd posted a 38% decline in net profit from over a year earlier to ₹1,341 crore in the September quarter, due to a one-time tax and interest provisioning of ₹1,619 crore following a ruling by the Supreme Court that telecom companies could not treat license fee as an expense.

- Gulveen Aulakh

"This decision does not alter the amount of VLF allowed as a deduction over the license period but creates a timing difference wherein the later years will have a higher deduction. This has resulted in additional tax provision of ₹226.3 crore primarily due to the change in effective tax rate on account of adoption of a new tax regime," the company said on Tuesday in its Q2FY24 earnings report.