Monday, June 8, 2009

NTA Warns SNPL Against Unhealthy Competition

Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA), the country´s telecom regulatory body, has warned Spice Nepal Private Limited (SNPL) not to enter into unhealthy competition by demolishing infrastructure set up by other telecom companies. 

The warning was issued after SNPL, the operator of Mero Mobile, damaged optical fiber cables laid by Nepal Telecom (NT) and United Telecom Limited (UTL) along the Birgunj-Hetauda highway. The damage was done after SNPL started digging canal at the same place where NT and UTL had laid their cables.

NT has confirmed that the ducts containing the fiber optic cables of the company were damaged. Authorized UTL officials were not available for comment but reliable sources told myrepublica.com that more damage was done to the cables laid by UTL than NT. SNPL denied to comment on the matter.

To keep the situation under control, NTA has issued verbal instruction to SNPL to continue with the work in the presence of an NT official for the time being. "From Tuesday, a joint monitoring team comprising officials of the three telecom companies will oversee the ongoing work of SNPL," a reliable NTA source said.

However, NT has asked NTA to come up with a long-term solution to address the problem. "It is likely that the damage will be caused to optical fibers laid by other companies while carrying out maintenance work," a reliable NT source told myrepublica.com. "The only alternative could be stopping telecom companies from laying fiber optic cables in places where one company has already laid similar cables."

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