Airtel to pay ₹10,000 crore AGR dues in first post-moratorium instalment
₹10,000 crore in adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues to the government by 31 March, according to two people familiar with the matter, even as the telecom operator presses for a recalculation of its liabilities on par with Vodafone Idea.This marks the first tranche of payments after a four-year moratorium ended in September 2025, with instalment schedule beginning March 2026.“The company will need to make this AGR dues payment, which includes licence fee and spectrum usage charges (SUC),” one of the people cited above said, seeking anonymity. “At ₹10,000 crore, this payment would be just one-fifth of the total AGR dues of the company,” the person said, adding that the company is taking up the re-calculation of the dues issue separately.Bharti Airtel’s deferred payment liability towards AGR was at ₹38,604 crore, according to its FY25 annual report.
With interest accrued, the same has risen over ₹40,000 crore.A query emailed to Bharti Airtel earlier on Sunday did not elicit any response till the press time.The payment comes as the company has written to the government seeking reassessment and recalculation of its AGR dues, after the Union cabinet in December froze Vodafone Idea’s AGR dues at ₹87,695 crore as of 31 December 2025 and approved a payment plan allowing the company to clear these dues between FY32 and FY41. The telecom department also began reassessing Vodafone Idea’s AGR dues for the period from FY07 to FY19.The reassessment exercise followed Supreme Court rulings in October and November 2025 that allowed the government to reassess and recalculate the company’s AGR dues.In January this year, Bharti Enterprises founder and chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal had said the company has written to the government seeking
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