Ombudsman As An Institution Of Administrative Justice In Indian Telecommunication Sector
- YourLawArticle
- 11 hours ago
- 2 min read
Authored by:
Sanskriti Dewangan, Advocate, Bar Council of Chhattisgarh, Currently Practising Before The Hon’ble High Court of Chhattisgarh
Abstract
Telecommunications has become deeply embedded in the daily lives of Indian citizens, shaping how people communicate, conduct business, and access public services. The sector's expansion has brought with it a sharp rise in consumer grievances — billing irregularities, poor service quality, unsolicited charges, and opaque contractual practices have become routine complaints. Yet the institutional response to these grievances remains inadequate. This article examines the structural limitations of the existing grievance redressal framework in the Indian telecommunications sector and argues for the introduction of a dedicated Telecom Ombudsman. This is not a novel proposal — the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India ('TRAI') itself floated the idea in 2004 and formally recommended it to the Central Government in 2017. Neither recommendation was acted upon, and the question has grown more pressing since the passage of the Telecommunications Act 2023, which repealed the Indian Telegraph Act 1885 and introduced a new statutory dispute-resolution layer of its own. Drawing on the institutional history of the Ombudsman model and a comparative analysis of operational models in the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada, the article identifies structural features — independence, informality, accessibility, and enforceability — that have made those systems effective, and examines the legal feasibility of establishing a Telecom Ombudsman within India's current statutory framework. The article concludes that the absence of a specialised, consumer-facing grievance institution remains a gap in administrative justice — one the regulator has already identified twice and the executive has twice declined to fill.
Keywords: Telecom Ombudsman, Administrative Justice, Consumer Grievance Redressal, TRAI, TDSAT, Telecommunications Act 2023, Consumer Protection, Regulatory Accountability, Access to Justice.
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