Communication facilities in rural areas: Senate body voices concerns over delay

Senate's Standing Committee on Information Technology and Telecommunication (IT & Telecom) on Friday expressed concern over the delay in providing communication facilities in the rural areas, especially Balochistan and Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata).
The committee, which met here under the chair of Senator Moula Bakhsh Chandio with members Senator Pervez Rasheed and Senator Mir Mohabbat Khan Marri, however, showed confidence on the procedure of issuance of licenses for laying optical fibres. It said it has no reservations regarding specifications as advertised in tenders for invitation of bids and has no doubts over the transparency of the procedure.
Senator Marri, on the occasion, showed concern over the acceleration of the procedure and asked Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to expedite the whole process and remove hurdles if any, so that people living in the far-flung areas can easily be connected with the rest of the world.
Replying to the query, Chairman PTA, Dr Muhammad Yaseen said they are laying optical fibres in Balochistan and offering 92 percent subsidy to the telecom operators, but they are showing reluctance as operational cost is too high in the area. He apprised the committee that government is giving top most priority to initiate (projects of) communication facilities in the rural areas, saying the telecommunication facility in Kohlo will become functional from April 2011.
Briefing the committee on laying the optical fibres, he said there are three types of licenses under which optical fibres can be laid, firstly Long Distance and International (LDI) for nation-wide operations, Local Loop (LL) for region-wise operation and Infrastructure License (IL) for nation-wide purposes. LDI licenses, he added, are issued between 2004-6 and the process was based on the deregulation policy in 2003.
Giving further details, Dr Muhammad Yaseen said 25 applications for LDI licenses were received (23 in 2004 and two applications in 2005). Out of the total 25 operators, 14 were granted LDI licenses, three were rejected due to non-payment of the license fee and two were rejected due to security clearance, whereas the rest of six operators opted out, he said.
He apprised the committee that at present, there are 13 operational LDIs and so far, three telecom companies have laid their own nation-wide optical fibre and the remaining operators have leased the transmission facility. Replying to the query of Senator Marri if a telecom company becomes defaults then how the money will be recovered, chairman PTA said initially a show cause notice is issued and license of the relevant company is cancelled. The committee was also told that from June onwards, Universal Service Funds (SF), which was previously collected by PTA, will now be collected by the ministry of information technology.