Citycell, the country’s first mobile operator, which has been inactive since 2016, reportedly submitted a formal request to the telecom regulator for the reinstatement of its licence. In the letter, Citycell claimed its licence was revoked due to a “misperception” that it was linked to a political party not favored by the Awami League government at the time. The operator’s services were officially discontinued in 2016 after the regulator withdrew its spectrum, marking the end of over two decades of service.
In October 2016, following Citycell’s failure to pay outstanding dues on time, the telecom regulator sent a technical team to the company’s Mohakhali headquarters in Dhaka to shut down its network switch. At the time, Citycell owed Tk 477.69 crore to the regulator, according to the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) as reported.
As reported, the court later ordered Citycell to pay two-thirds of this amount, or Tk 318.42 crore, within four weeks. Citycell reported paying Tk 244 crore, based on its own calculations, in an effort to prevent closure.
As reported by The Daily Star, Tarana Halim, the then state minister for telecom, announced at a press conference that the decision was in line with a High Court ruling and that the spectrum suspension was permanent. Despite this, the BTRC, following an Appellate Division order, returned Citycell’s spectrum, allowing it to use it for radio communications, though the company failed to resume operations.
Citycell, which operated on code-division multiple access (CDMA) technology, saw its customer base shrink from 30 lakh in the early 2010s to 5.59 lakh by 2016. The difference between CDMA and the more widely adopted global system for mobile communications (GSM) technology was significant, with GSM handsets offering SIM card slots, a feature that appealed more to tech-savvy customers as reported.
In September 2022, the government canceled Citycell’s frequency allocation due to unpaid dues. In March 2023, BTRC revoked the company’s licence, citing an outstanding debt of Tk 218 crore.
As reported, In its letter to BTRC, PBTL claimed that had Citycell not been shut down due to the decisions of the BTRC and Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, its revenue over the past eight years could have reached Tk 2,000 crore.
The company is now seeking reinstatement of its cellular mobile phone operator licence, radio communication equipment licence, and a complete 10 MHz spectrum. Citycell also reportedly requested that licences for 2G, 3G, 4G, and 5G services remain valid until 2033, along with the waiving of what it describes as an “unlawful and arbitrary” penalty for non-payment of the licence fee.
PBTL is chaired by former senior BNP leader and former foreign minister Morshed Khan.
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