NEW DELHI, July 7: The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has softened its stand against the blacklisting of the 14 companies who were alleged to be indulging in cartelisation in the prices of optical fibres to be supplied to the DoT.

The move comes as a surprise as the DoT and the Minister of Communications, Beni Prasad Verma had earlier announced tough action against these firms and had issued show cause notices to these firms to explain their indulgence in unfair trade practices.

This major reversal in the DoT's stand, it is learnt, is a result of the advice from the Union Ministry of Law. The Law ministry, in a letter to DoT, stated that the government would be caught on the wrong foot if they decided to blacklist these firms as in the second round of tendering the DoT had placed orders for supply of optical fibre cables on these very firms.

The only firm against which the DoT is still proceeding to blacklist the company is Advanced Radio Masts (ARM) which was involved in the Telecom scam last year. Senior officials of the DoT claim that the ARM case is different and hence cannot be clubbed with the other firms which had been identified for blacklisting.

The fourteen firms have now seem to gained a fresh lease of life after the DoT's decision to drop proceedings.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.