The telecom tribunal TDSAT on Thursday restrained The Department of Telecom (DoT) from taking any action against Bharti Airtel in a case related to penalty on the latter over faulty customer details.

DoT on April 3 had imposed a fresh penalty of Rs 36.94 crore for allegedly not disconnecting mobile connections with faulty customer details.

Terming the additional Rs 36.94 crore penalty as illegal, Bharti Airtel said that while the dispute regarding rejection of these customer application forms (CAFs) itself is pending adjudication before this tribunal, there is no justification whatsoever for further penalising the petitioner for not disconnecting these mobile connections and/or taking any other action in that regard.

The operator has requested the tribunal to quash the same. A TDSAT bench headed by Justice S B Sinha also reserved its order on the interim plea of Bharti Airtel to stay the 'demand notes' issued by the government in this regard.

The DoT has already imposed a penalty of Rs 111.25 crore after its Telecom Enforcement Resource and Monitoring (TERM) Cells observed 'faulty CAFs' for the months of March 2011, April 2011 & July 2011.

Bharti Airtel had moved the TDSAT challenging the penalty.  In February the tribunal in an interim order had directed Airtel to pay 25 per cent of the sum charged.

"DoT has originally imposed a penalty for the months of March, April & July 2011, totalling Rs 111 crore, which is impugned by Airtel vide Petition No. 27 of 2012.

"And now vide the order of April 3, 2012, another penalty is being imposed on totally unsustainable and arbitrary grounds which tantamount to penalty on penalty, which is illegal," Bharti Airtel had said in its petition.