Leading telecom operators, including Bharti Airtel and Vodafone, would have to deposit with the Supreme Court half of the Rs 470-crore carrier charges they owe to state-owned BSNL, the apex court said today.

"You would have to show your bona fide and have to submit at least half the amount in the Supreme Court registry ...then only we would stay the TDSAT's order," a bench comprising Chief Justice S H Kapadia and Justice K S Radhakrishnan told COAI and AUSPI, the two operators lobbies, which have challenged the sectoral tribunal TDSAT's order.

The court was hearing two petitions filed lobby groups-- COAI and AUSPI challenging the TDSAT order which set aside a directive of telecom sector regulator TRAI to pay carriage charges to BSNL on a uniform rate of 20 paise a call for completing intra-circle calls.

BSNL levies carriage charges for forwarding calls originating from private telco networks to its own network.

The court also directed members of COAI, including Vodafone and Aircel to submit affidavits having their due towrdas BSNL. "Each of the operator would indicate the exact amount which according to them, they have to give," the bench said.

The country's largest operator Bharti Airtel from the GSM side and AUSPI lobby group, which represents CDMA-based telcos Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices, have already filed their statements.

Solicitor General Gopal Subramanium, appearing for BSNL, informed the apex Court that private telecom operators owe around Rs 470 crore to the PSU.

He further submitted that Airtel, Tata Tele and Reliance alone owe Rs 170 crore to the state owned telco.

According to the operators, TDSAT has also set aside two letters written by TRAI on May 17, 2006 to the PSU and "wrongly allowed BSNL to levy distance-based carriage charges on the appellant instead of a uniform carriage charge of 20 paise per minute in case of intra-circle".

The lobby groups have further submitted that TRAI, in its regulation, had directed BSNL to take 20 paise as carriage charge for all calls for and from private cellular mobile networks.

"However, in violation of the said IUC Regulation, BSNL was levying a distance-based carriage charge of 65 paise, 90 paise and Rs 1.10 for distance slabs of 50 to 200 km, 200 to 500 km and above 500 km respectively," the operators said.