Dhaka: The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the authorities concerned to restore the frequency of Citycell within 24 hours.

A three-member bench of the Appellate Division, headed by Chief Justice SK Sinha, passed the order following a petition.

The SC also asked the relevant authorities to reactivate Citycell's liscence and fixed August 6 for hearing on a petition filed for contempt of court.

On Monday last, the Bangladesh Telecommunication and Regulatory Commission (BTRC) decided to scrap the liscence of the country's first mobile phone operator, Citycell.

On October 20, 2016, the BTRC suspended the spectrum of Citycell as it failed to pay the outstanding payment of Tk 477.63 crore.

The Citycell authorities filed the petition with the Appellate Division on October 24 seeking a stay on the decision of the BTRC that suspended its spectrum for the non-payment of its dues.

On November 3 last year, the Supreme Court ordered the authorities to immediately reopen Citycell frequency and directed mobile firm to pay Tk 1 billion in dues by November 19.

The SC also fixed Tk 5 lakh as honorarium to the committee chief while Tk 2.5 lakh each to the other members of the committee and asked both sides - Citycell and the BTRC - to bear the honorarium.

The Appellate Division ordered Citycell to pay its Tk 477.51 crore dues to the BTRC in two installments to continue its operation on August 29.

The apex court had asked the mobile phone operator to pay the first slot of Tk 318.42 crore, two-thirds of the total outstanding payment, within October 19.

As Citycell failed to pay the two-thirds of the total amount within the stipulated time, the BTRC decided to suspend the operations of the mobile phone operator as per law.