Fire at BSNL head office paralyses services in district

Karimnagar/Jagtial: Due to the fire that broke out at the BSNL headquarters in Karimnagar on Wednesday night, mobile and internet services were suspended in the district and the customers facing difficulties. With internet services in government offices temporarily stopped, registrations were disrupted at the sub-registrar offices, services were resumed immediately by taking internet connection through the cell phone, but not at the registration office in the district, there was some disruption in the sub-offices in the surrounding areas.

Banking transactions were severely affected as local branches of nationalised, cooperative and private banks could not link with their servers. Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) also did not work. Some banks were serving customers with alternative arrangements. The services of biometric machines installed to monitor the attendance of teachers in the government schools of the district were disrupted. The district education department was implementing biometric attendance in all 615 government schools in the district.

Biometric devices were being used by BSNL connections in 70 schools. Biometric attendance was not recorded in those schools on Thursday. Teachers were struggling for a while to register their attendance as they were saying 'no internet connection'. Some principals have conveyed the attendance of teachers to the concerned authorities through mobiles. All over the combined district there were 7,200 BSNL internet users, three lakh cell phone users. Three and leased circuits were being used by 780 Banks, Schools and Offices. Internet services were disrupted in various sections of the Collectorates across the three districts and services suspended in the district treasury department.

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..Many districts face hardships

Jagtial: Meanwhile, people in the Jagitial district have been facing untold hardships due to the disruption in the BSNL services. As many as 3 lakh consumers of BSNL in Karimangar, Pedapalli, Jagitial and Rajanna Sircilla are failing to access BSNL landlines, broadband and cyber services have been completely snapped since the night of March 22. In particular, people in the Jagitial district had to put up with several hardships as they could not reach out local fuse call office following the snapping off of electricity wires during the unseasonal rains that lashed the district.

Apart from the TSRTC the government offices using the BSNL services had to face troubles in extending services to the citizens. However, efforts are on to restore the services to normalcy and the BSNL GM Chandra Mouli and DGM Dinesh were holding the review of restoration works. Some services in the district are expected to be restored by Sunday and all services within the next three days, the BSNL officials said.

As there was a lot of work in the month of March, they were immediately connected to Wi-Fi through the cell phone and the services were running. Nagaraju, Deputy Director, District Treasury Office, told The Hans India that an alternative was immediately arranged but the BSNL officials said that they would restore it immediately. Alternative to broadband services were used in Satavahana University. USB tethering was connected to laptops and daily work was being done. The collection of information continues to be distributed but it was said that excessive data is being used. Chiranjeevi DGM BSNL told The Hans India that the issue would be resolved till Saturday night. Meanwhile, the CGM was visiting the district today and assessing the situation.