Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd. has filed a complaint with the Competition Commission of India (CCI) against Vodafone India Ltd., Bharti Airtel Ltd. and Idea Cellular Ltd. alleging abuse of dominance and cartelisation, a person familiar with the development told BloombergQuint on the condition of anonymity.

Reliance Jio filed the complaint on the basis of a letter that the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) wrote to the Department of Telecom (DoT) last month, the person added.

In its letter, the TRAI had stated that Vodafone, Airtel, and Idea, jointly with the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), denied points of interconnection to Reliance Jio. The telecom regulator also pointed to a COAI letter dated September 2, 2016 that indicated attempts by the three incumbent telecom operators to stifle competition in the market.

In its complaint, Reliance Jio has stated that the relevant geographic market to assess anti-competitive behaviour should be the market for call termination in each circle that Vodafone, Airtel, and Idea operate in.

Idea Cellular’s chief executive officer Himanshu Kapania rubbished the allegations while responding to BloombergQuint’s query, “No such details have reached us from CCI. Idea will never be involved in any form of cartelisation. The group has the highest standards of compliance. The mobile industry is hyper competitive with 8-9 operators active per circle. Idea is ranked third with just 18-19 percent market share, so has limited market power.”

Airtel too said that it has not heard from CCI and in turn alleged Reliance Jio’s claims follow a “standard pattern of browbeating aimed at creating multiple regulatory hurdles in the sincere efforts of other players in the space”.