A file photo shows a man browsing internet on a computer in Dhaka. The Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission initiated a move to increase the licence acquisition fees of internet service providers drastically following an instruction from the posts and telecommunications ministry. — New Age photo
Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission initiated a move to increase the licence acquisition fees of internet service providers drastically following an instruction from the post and telecommunication ministry.
Internet service providers said that increasing licence fees would benefit heavyweight investors in the ISP business, while small area-based ISPs might fail to continue business due to imposition of such high licence fee and annual fee.
Besides, increase of licence fees would impact negatively over the broadband internet penetration and quality of service across the country, they said.
The BTRC initiative was taken at a special commission meeting presided over by its chairman Shahjahan Mahmood that has already forwarded to the ministry, a BTRC official told New Age on Sunday.
Under the move, the telecommunication regulator has already forwarded a letter to the posts and telecommunication ministry.
As per the fresh proposal, BTRC would issue three categories of ISP licences— nationwide, urban and rural.
Nationwide ISP service providers would be allowed to operate their business across the country, while urban ISP service providers will operate their business within a metropolitan city, divisional headquarters and district areas.
Nationwide licence providers will have to pay Tk 25 lakh as licence acquisition fee along with Tk 5 lakh annual licence fee.
The urban service providers will have to pay Tk 15 lakh licence acquisition fee along with Tk 3 lakh annual licence fee.
Under the existing guidelines, nationwide and urban ISPs have to pay Tk 1 lakh as licence acquisition fee and annual licence fee respectively.
The licence acquisition fee and annual licence fee were proposed at Tk 1 lakh and Tk 25,000 respectively.
Besides, the regulator proposed that the all the three types of ISP licencees will have to share revenue with government at 1 per cent rate and payment to the government’s social obligation fund at the rate of 1 per cent would be a must.
The commission also decided to issue registration certificate to cyber cafe instead of issuing licence, while they will have to pay Tk 25,000 as registration fee.
BTRC gave the proposal to the ministry following a decision of the telecommunication ministry that was taken at a meeting in February this year, another BTRC official said.
Assuring quality service of the ISPs and keeping the number of ISP licencee companies low were the reasons behind the
ministry’s instruction, he said.
Besides, the ministry also decided to scrap licences of the ISP service providers which would fail to fulfill licensing conditions.
The ministry issued a letter to the BTRC on May 29 this year in this regard asking the telecom regulator to propose for increasing ISP licence acquisition fees.
Asked, Internet Service Providers Association of Bangladesh General Secretary Emdadul Hoque, however, told New Age that the government’s move to increase licence acquisition fee and annual licence fee would impact the country’s broadband penetration and quality of service at large.
He also said that implementation of proposals would eliminate small-scale ISPs from the business and help the heavyweight ISPs to grab the market.
Besides, increase in licence acquisition fees and annual licence fees would ultimately increase broadband internet price at the consumer end, Edadul said.
Source: New Age
