PTCL officials negligence: Most of lines go dead in N Waziristan

MIRAN SHAH, July 13 : The break down in telephone lines of nine exchanges of Pakistan Telecommunication Limited (PTCL) in North Waziristan Agency due to absence of staff has suspended the communication and added to the hardships of the customers. The break down of the PTCL system has also left adverse affects on credibility of PTCL beside financial losses to the company. According to details, most of the telephone lines of some nine telephone exchanges established by the PTCL in various areas of North Waziristan Agency with at least 12,000 connections have been silent for the past many days due to absence of PTCL staff on the pretext of bad law and order situation in the area. Due to dead communication lines, the residents were unable to make contacts with the remaining parts of the country which added to their sufferings and especially the people in foreign countries were facing acute problem in contacting their beloved ones in the tension-hit area. "Officials of all other government departments were smoothly performing their duties in the area but the PTCL workers remained absent on the pretext of bad law and order situation prevailed there," locals said. Students studying in the far flung areas told INP that non availability of communication services in their native area has added to their difficulties as drone attacks were of routine matter in those areas they can't contact with family members if any such incident occurs there. Locals of North Waziristan Agency demanded the concerned authorities to take stern action against those receiving monthly payments from PTCL at home without performing duties and also take seriously the issue in order to solve the problem on urgent basis.