Bharti Airtel, Vodafone under MRTPC scanner

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The tariff hike has also been challenged in the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) by a consumer organization even as the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has referred the matter to the telecom regulatory body, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).

According to sources close to the development, the MRTPC has taken a suo moto notice of the tariff hike based on newspaper reports and has directed its investigative arm, the Director General of Investigation and Registration (DGIR) to look into the matter.

Under Section 10 of the MRTP Act 1969, cartelization in any industry is prohibited and is defined as a "restrictive trade practice" as it imposes unjustified burden on consumers.

The sources said that the newspaper reports suggested that the tariff hike appeared to be a coordinated action.

In August, both Bharti Airtel and Vodafone-Essar raised tariffs for STD, local calls, SMS and value-added services. However, they did not inform the subscribers before going in for the tariff hike and chose to inform them through small advertisements in newspapers. Subsequently, another leading operator Idea Cellular followed suit.

Soon, the tariff hike was protested by subscribers of both Airtel and Vodafone, who objected to the sudden increase in SMS and local call tariffs in the same network from Re. 1 to Rs. 1.20. The companies had also hiked STD tariffs by over 10 percent for prepaid users.Though the companies had cited declining average revenue per user (ARPU) as the rationale behind increase in tariffs, many subscribers felt that the move smacked of cartelization as the companies failed to inform the subscribers before hiking the tariffs.

The two companies are the leading GSM operators in India and have a combined subscriber base of around 55 million mobile users. In India, there are about 135 million GSM subscribers and around 47 million CDMA subscribers.

Meanwhile, the two private sector mobile operators have defended their actions, claiming that the tariff hike was not across the board but only in some schemes limited to certain circles. They also said that the measure was a correction of certain anomalies in some of the tariff packages.

However, the TDSAT has hauled up TRAI for failing to look into the matter and has ordered it to intervene if the companies were found resorting to illegal tariff hike.

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