DoT has been told to withdraw its circular dated January 15, 1999 under which it had levied Rs 15,000 charge per access line on an annual basis.The sum was levied over and above the rental for the PSTN line and was applicable to all e-mail providers and ISPs.

TRAI had sought clarification from DoT last month after the matter was brought to its notice by the Internet Service Providers Association of India in March this year.

DoT later withdrew the levy in May last, but replaced the access charge with telephone rental. After TRAI's intervention, DoT superseded and withdrew its January circular in May 1999, but said service providers will have to pay their dues for the past period which in certain cases amounted to huge arrears spread over four to five years.

This was again challenged by ISPAI. DoT had argued that e-mail providers were like private data networks who had got extra lines on priority earlier, putting extra pressure on DoT network.

In its reply, ISPAI claimed that DoT had never raised this point earlier and even its January 99 circular was merely a re-issuance of an earlier circular issued by it in March 1995. ISPAI also said that e-mail networks were neither private data networks nor closed user groups.

It approached TRAI seeking urgent intervention after Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd, Mumbai combined the arrears of the access charge with regular bills of Satyam Infoway and set a deadline for clearance of these dues. The crisis was precipitated as MTNL issued an ultimatum to Satyam and Global Electronic Commerce, threatening disconnection upon non-payment.

TRAI held consultations on this issue and arrived at the decision after seeking comments from all concerned and ruled that e-mail and internet providers could not be considered as private data networks.

Terming TRAI decision as a ``correction of an aberration'', ISPAI secretary Amitabh Singhal said it will usher in a lot of confidence among the operators.