Vodafone Idea issued show cause notice by Trai for RedX premium tariff plan

Kolkata: The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) on Tuesday evening issued a show cause notice to Vodafone Idea, asking why it shouldn’t ban the company’s RedX premium tariff plan that the regulator said appeared to be making false claims about offering faster data speeds and, in turn, misleading consumers. The regulator has given time till August 31 for the telecom operator to respond.

Trai though has not sought any explanation from Bharti Airtel NSE -2.01 %, after the Sunil Mittal-led telco modified its Platinum tariff plan by taking out both the faster data speeds and priority network elements from the offer, and filed a revised plan with the sector regulator. “We’ve pointed out to VIL (Vodafone Idea Ltd NSE -1.11 %) in the show cause notice that its fundamental claim of offering faster data speeds to RedX customers appears to be bogus as the telco has not been able to prove in the first place to the authority’s technical team that it is actually possible to offer the promised faster data speeds to RedX consumers,” a senior Trai official told ET.