Visakhapatnam: Culvert works snap BSNL cables; telecom services hit
Services to thousands of BSNL consumers, both telephone and internet services, were hit in Akkayyapalem area.
Visakhapatnam: Services to thousands of BSNL consumers, both telephone and internet services, were hit in Akkayyapalem area on Tuesday due to reckless digging of the road by a private contractor. As part of the city development works, a private contractor has been laying a new culvert in the Railway New Colony near Akkayyapalem telephone exchange. Without giving any prior information to the BSNL officials, the contractor dug up the road where the BSNL cables were planted, cutting off the telephone and internet services to the nearby residents.
According to BSNL AE, Ravi Sankar, about 1,500 telephone services were hit in the area and it would take another four days to restore the lines. “We have lodged a complaint with the IV Town police station about the contractor snapping the BSNL cables and the contractor has been absconding. If the road was dug in a systematic manner, there would have been no such breakdown in telephone services. BSNL consumers of Akkayyapalem, Nandagiri Nagar and Yerukamamba temple road were affected by the breakdown. It would require the assistance of at least 20 men for the next four days as they have to re-connect at least 1,000 wires on each side of the road. We are suspecting that the contractor may have cut the wire to sell it to the scrap vendors,” Mr. Ravi Sankar said.