The telephone exchange in Bhagalpur. Picture by Amit Kumar

Bhagalpur, April 22: More than 80,000 BSNL customers in Bhagalpur have been subjected to difficulties in getting connectivity for the past three days owing to cable faults. The faulty BSNL system had an adverse effect on other organisations like banks, where transactions remained suspended for most of the time.

Sources said that on April 20, because of damaged underground optical fibres near Vikramshila Ganga bridge, the BSNL stopped its mobile service completely. The damage had shut down Bhagalpur-Patna, Bhagalpur-Katihar, Bhagalpur-Khagaria and Bhagalpur-Calcutta lines.

On April 19 evening, a few criminals damaged the optical fibres near Naugachia and subsequently thrashed BSNL workers, when they reached the site for repairing.

On April 17, Naugachia police received a complaint stating that BSNL workers had dug up a ditch for repairing the optical fibres. “They did not cover the ditch and some motorcyclists fell over it. Two days after the incident when the BSNL workers reached the spot to repair the cable a few criminals beat them up them and also damaged the repaired cable,” sources said.

According to Shyam Babu, the general manager of BSNL, Bhagalpur circle, because of the optical fibre damage, the master switching centre (getaway-MSC) link met with a hitch. He, however, claimed that after assurances from the police, the BSNL workers managed to repair the fault but the repairing near Vikramshila bridge required more time.

Deputy general manager, BSNL mobile, Arun Kumar said that on April 21 evening, BSNL managed to restore the network by diverting the temporary Varanasi-Calcutta-Ranchi route. “It was very difficult to divert the route since it is the busiest. At any time, cellphone network services could be disrupted on this route,” Arun said. Moreover, the emergency device, which is used as a back-up during optical fibre damages, did not work properly yesterday.

On the other hand, because of the snag, tension is brewing among the BSNL subscribers. “My BSNL number is not working and it feels like I have been disconnected with the rest of the world,” said Bipin Kumar, a local silk trader.

“I have been visiting the bank for the past three days to draw money but I could not because of the link failure,” Arun Mandal, a retired teacher said. “Most of the banks are facing problems because of the link failure. Only those banks are operating, which has V-set facility,” said Dinesh Prasad, chief manager of the main branch of State Bank of India in Bhagalpur.

“This is not a secluded incident. Every month, we face such problems because of the technical faults of the optical cables,” was the general complaint of the BSNL subscribers. When asked, Shyam Babu said because of the roadside digging, underground cables of BSNL get damaged frequently. Giving an example, Shyam said: “BSNL recently had asked the Aircel mobile company to pay Rs 1.5 lakh penalty. The company had damaged the underground optical fibres of BSNL during digging works on April 17.”

Shyam, however, said the faults would soon be repaired and mobile network would be resumed soon. However, till filing of the report, BSNL cellphones remained defunct.