LAHORE
Efforts are underway to restore telecommunication services, which were suspended due to fire erupted at building of the national telecom company exchange on Edgerton Road on Saturday late.
PTCL spokesperson Imran Janjua informed TheNation that maximum connectivity had already been done by the technical staff in major areas of Lahore.
“The emergency service managed to control the fire on Monday evening. The staff of the PTCL already shifted maximum traffic on alternate routes and it was a great work by the technical staff,” said Imran.
Sources, however, said that it might took another two days for the fully restoration of the services in the city. It was learnt that Saturday night’s fire disrupted around 20,000 telephone connections and almost 10,000 internet services in major areas of the provincial metropolis.
“So far around 70 per cent telephone lines and internet connections have been restored,” said sources. They added that the company management on Sunday evening shifted many connections to Garden Town exchange on temporary basis and repair work is in full swing.
It has also been learnt that hundreds of telephone connections and internet services are still not working in many areas including Nisbat Road, Davis Road, Lawrence Road, Queens Road, Mozang and Lakshmi areas.
The PTCL exchange at Edgerton Road is being considered backbone of company’s DSL services in Lahore. The fire damaged three top floors including the U Phone office at fifth floor. The emergency services took almost two days to fully control the fire in building which caused the disconnection of telecommuting services at government offices, main hotels other top building of Lahore.
It brought disruption at automated teller machines (ATMs) and other transaction system at main banks and financial institution.
An inquiry team is estimating the initial losses which could be expected as millions of rupees. Another inquiry team is determining the reason behind the fire which is yet to be ascertained.