January 08, 2008

Internet in danger in Bangladesh

The Daily Star reports:
Internet service providers, IT experts and businessmen say the government is responsible for frequent cuts in the country's optical fiber submarine cable and for the consequent constraints in moving business forward.

Sources said a number of BTTB officials pocketed large amount of money in the name of fibre-optic cable maintenance. They said the officials withdraw allocated budget before doing any maintenance work.

BTTB loses revenue of $70,000 per hour with every disruption. The BTTB invested $35.1 million for the submarine cable.
A round table of Internet service providers arranged by BDNews24, IT experts and businessmen finds that the government is responsible for frequent cuts in the country's optical fibre submarine cable and for the consequent constraints in moving business forward.
Rafiqul Islam Rowly, president of BASIS, asked why the optical fibre cable has not yet been declared a "key point installation".

"We're really living on a single oxygen line," Rowly said.

Bangladesh introduced the fibre optic service on May 21 2006. The service has been disrupted a total of 23 times because of cuts in the cable between Chittagong and Dhaka. State-run BTTB have said "sabotage" was the cause of cable cuts on at least eight occasions.

The speakers slammed the government for not yet bringing the culprits responsible for cutting the cable to book.
It seems all problem lies inside BTTB.

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