Parliament Building: The government has realised a total of Taka 1544.73 crore as revenue from the country's six mobile phone operators against call charges and sale of subscriber identity module (SIM) cards in the first six months of the current fiscal year.

Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith informed this in reply to a question from treasury bench member Nurunnabi Chowdhury (Bhola-3) in the House on Monday.

The minister said there has been 15 percent VAT on mobile phone talking at the subscriber level since long, while three percent additional supplementary duty was imposed from 2015-16 fiscal.

As a result, he said, Taka 1253.14 crore revenue was realised from the six cellphone operators against the call charges and Taka 291.59 crore against the SIM sales till December of 2015-16 fiscal year.

Muhith also said of the amount, Taka 981.91 crore was realised from Grameenphone Company Ltd, Taka 424.31 crore from Robi Axiata Ltd, Taka 416.25 crore from Banglalink Digital Communication Ltd, Taka 108.44 crore from Airtel Bangladesh Ltd, Taka 70.90 crore from Teletalk Bangladesh Ltd and Taka 0.01 crore from Pacific Telecom Bangladesh Ltd (Citycell).