|
COAI seeks concessional duty for spares
Neeraja Kumar
New Delhi: In a pre-budget submission, the cellular operators have urged the Government to extend the concession of 21.8 per cent custom duty being currently levied on new equipment for setting up telecom networks to "spares and up-grades for various cellular mobile equipment under list 12, which currently attracts residual a duty of 53.8 per cent." In the pre-budget proposal, the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) has also asked the Government to extend the valid date for concessional rate on new equipment from March 31, 2001. As per the submission, the present customs tariff for a defined list of capital goods for cellular service providers is 21.8 per cent. This is valid till the end of the current financial year. "As most of the projects are still to achieve break-even, it is requested that that existing effective tariff of 21.8 per cent be continued for two or more years," it adds. The COAI has also submitted a proposal for reducing custom duty on cellular infrastructure items, includingmicrowave (MW) radios and growth hardware for switch and base stations- from the current level of 50.8 per cent and bring it on par with the duty being charged on new equipment. MW radios are required for access and backbone and growth hardware for switch and base stations - this includes transcoder, mobile switching centre (MSC), base station controller (BSC), base transceiver station, etc. The COAI has also proposed that the effective custom duties on cellular handsets, which currently hover at a total of 26.7 per cent, should be brought down to zero. Copyright © 2001 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
|
