The government today issued a notice to Sistema Shyam Teleservices (SSTL) to terminate licences for Kerala, West Bengal and Assam for delay in roll- out of services in these three circles.

"We have sent a termination notice to SSTL for the delay in network roll-out in three circles -- Kerala, West Bengal and Assam," a senior Department of Communications (DoT) official said.

When contacted, an SSTL spokesperson said, "We have received the communication from DoT on the issue of roll out obligations for three circles -- Kerala, West Bengal and Assam. We will be replying to DoT on the same."

SSTL offers CDMA voice and data services in 18 telecom service areas and have a total 10 million subscribers.

"We had launched our services in these states way back in 2009 and as of now, we have over 1.5 million customers in these three states," the spokesperson added.

Earlier, the DoT had issued 119 notices to new telecom operators for missing their network roll-out obligation last month and imposed hefty penalties on them.

As per the conditions, the licencees were required to roll-out their services in 90 per cent of service areas in metros and 10 per cent in district headquarters within 12 months (52 weeks) from the date of award of licence.

The operators were supposed to pay the penalty for missing roll-out obligations within 15 days of the notice, but some of these companies had moved the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) over the DoT's move.

TDSAT had subsequently asked Uninor, Aircel subsidiary Dishnet Wireless and Videocon Telecom to pay a part of the penalty imposed on them for missing their roll-out obligations.

As per the conditions of the Unified Access Service Licence (UASL), the telcos were required to roll-out their networks within one year from the date of allocation of spectrum.