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BTRC to decide VRS of Robi, Airtel merger by this week

02 Oct, 2016

The telecom regulator will take decision about the voluntary retirement scheme for employees who wish to leave Airtel before completion of the merger of the mobile phone company with another operator Robi.
Officials of the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission said that as per the court order the commission would decide the VRS and payment method of the merger fees and spectrum adjustment charges worth Tk 607 crore.
They said that the issues would be placed before a commission meeting scheduled on September 29.
The BTRC last Thursday received the certified order of the High Court that approved the companies’ merger with conditions.
‘Robi and Airtel will submit a report on how they will executive the VRS and after analysing that the commission will take the decision,’ a senior BTRC official told New Age.
He said that the court also provided some options to determine the VRS.
‘We will consider those and might add or subtract, if necessary,’ he added.
The BTRC in its merger conditions made VRS mandatory for the Airtel employees but before court clearance of the merger the design of the scheme came under debate.
A group of Airtel employees urged the court to increase the facilities in the VRS saying that in the existing VRS Airtel employees were proposed to be given one month’s gross salary for each year of their service in the company.
They demanded four months’ basic salary for higher management and five months’ basic salary for lower managerial level as VRS compensation.
Robi, however, said it can maximum provide two months’ gross salary for higher management and three months’ gross salary for junior managerial level.
The court, after hearing the parties, said that the matter would be analysed and decided by the BTRC.
Malaysia-based Robi and India-based Airtel in September 2015 announced that their Bangladesh operations would be merged and they signed an agreement on January 29 in this connection.
The BTRC conducted a public hearing on the matter in February and after that proposed imposing spectrum adjustment fees and merger fees, along with mandatory VRS and return of 5MHz spectrum of 900 band to the government.
Upon completion of the merger, Robi’s parent company Axiata will hold 68.3 per cent controlling stake in the combined entity, while Bharti Airtel will hold 25 per cent and the remaining 6.7 per cent will be held by NTT DOCOMO of Japan.
At present, Axiata Group’s share in Robi is 91.59 per cent and NTT DOCOMO holds the rest 8.41 per cent.

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