BTRC publishes notice seeking auditor for Banglalink

After being dragged to court by Grameenphone and Robi over claims of unpaid dues, the BTRC is going to get the other private mobile phone operator Banglalink audited.

The telecoms regulator published a notice on Monday seeking letters of interest from willing local and foreign firms within Feb 4.

The information system audit of Banglalink is intended to be conducted from its inception to Dec 31, 2019 in line with the related laws with the commission’s own expenses, BTRC said in the notice.

The purview of the audit will range from regulatory to legal to technical to financial and other related matters.

The auditor will verify the revenue stated by the operator and analyse its financial statement.

Banglalink, the No.3 operator in terms of subscriber base with 35.112 million users, welcomed the BTRC move

Banglalink said, “As one of the leading compliant organizations in the country, we welcome the move taken by BTRC to audit Banglalink for verifying its compliance with the license obligations.

“Along with pledging to fully comply with the terms and conditions of the audit, we would like to assure BTRC of our full cooperation during the audit procedure,” Ankit Sureka, corporate communications senior manager of the telecom operator, said in a statement.

“However, we expect that the entire audit process will be conducted in an acceptable and fair manner following the local laws and international audit standards so that all the parties can come to a conclusion regarding the matter with full transparency,” he said.

“Furthermore, we also expect that all remaining operators whose audit has not been done yet (E.g. Airtel and Teletalk) should go through the same process to ensure a level playing field,” Sureka added.

The High Court had earlier declared invalid the appointment of an auditor for Banglalink when the BTRC had initiated the process in 2011.

Last year, the BTRC claimed around Tk 125.8 billion from Grameenphone and nearly Tk 8.7 billion from Robi saying these were dues found in audits.

Both companies moved the court and have been ordered to pay parts of the money as the hearings of their appeals have continued. Grameenphone has been ordered to pay Tk 20 billion and Robi Tk 1.38 billion.