R. JAYASIMHA BABU, J.

The petitioners are engaged in the business of providing cellular mobile telephone facility to subscribers, having been authorised to do so under the licences granted by the Department of Telecommunications, Government of India. They are aggrieved by the direction given by the Chief Commissioner of Income-tax to his subordinates to treat the payments made to them by their subscribers as coming within the definition of "fees for technical services" in section 194J read with section 9(1)(vii), Explanation 2 of the Income-tax Act and require the firms and companies subscribing to the petitioners' network, to deduct tax at source on the payments made by them to the petitioners.

The petitioners have averred that they have established the necessary infrastructure for the mobile communication network consisting of mobile switching centre which is an electronic exchange where switching function and call routing takes place; visitor location register which provides total storage for the variables and functions needed to handle calls to and from mobile subscribers in the service area. Home location register which provides permanent storage facility for all the