The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has rejected views of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on Bharti Airtel’s acquisition of Loop, stating that the deal does not violate any regulations.

TRAI had earlier informed the department that the agreement between the two companies implies that subscribers of Loop will be ported out involuntarily to Airtel, against the regulations of mobile number portability (MNP), which offers voluntary porting. TRAI had added that in fact the subscriber should be informed that the service provider is closing operations and needs to port out voluntarily. The regulator had also stated that the government would lose out on fees paid by operators while processing a porting request.

As per MNP regulations, a mobile number can be retained by a subscriber with a payment of Rs 19 to his or her operator, which in turn would pay one per cent to the government.

However, DoT is of the view that no acquisition in the sector would be possible on these grounds. They further believe that MNP facility allows the subscribers to shift out to another operator if they were not satisfied with Bharti Airtel's services.