In the villages of Salcete, where locals complaint and protest against mobile towers, mobile connectivity faces a huge problem. The only saving grace is government-owned BSNL landlines and broadband services.
But over the last few months BSNL services across Salcete villages has been disrupted terribly. Water in the optical fibre underground cable, carbon on the connectors, leaking roofs in the BSNL offices and no officer or point of contact in the villages at BSNL offices is what frustrates the consumer. Not to forget damaged underground cables, patched up optic fibres damaged from excavation of road and sewerage works is another reason for disrupted services.
One locality, which seems to face a massive connectivity issue, is Loutolim, where the BSNL office is located in a rented premises of an old dilapidated Portuguese home with Mangalore tiles which are cracked and broken and even the false ceiling has given away exposing the entire network and junction boxes to the monsoons. Even worse, the service room’s air-conditioning is misused by the BSNL operator at the Loutolim exchange. A server room door is kept jammed to ensure the air conditioning can be diverted for the operator at his desk thereby denying the important server of air conditioning and risking the server to overheat.
With the Internet and landline of BSNL being down for almost three days in Loutolim, the BSNL Telephone Engineer at Loutolim Mr Sutter explains, the connections and infrastructure at Loutolim is very weak. “The junction box is old and needs to be replaced; even the underground cable needs replacement but the BSNL head office at Margao pays no heed to our demands. There is no new equipment or replacement for the wires sanctioned for Loutolim exchange for years.”
Similarly in Benaulim, Braulio Britto explains to Herald how the networks are terrible in Benaulim and Colva because the cable is all patched up from the multiple times that it was damaged during road widening works in Benaulim, Cavelossim and Colva during BRICS summit. “First they always complained of carbon in the connections but just before BRICS they placed overhead connectors and the connections got better but once again the Internet has slowed completely and our landlines are dead. The problem is the multiple patches on the cable underground which get completely damaged because the underground network of pipes and wires is a mess and every excavation results in damage.”
While Herald visited the BSNL exchange at Curtorim we are shocked that the exchange is shut for over three days and the lines in the vicinity are completely down. Herald spoke to Menino Goes who works at the next door Electricity Department office and he explains.
“There are just linesmen here who stay out the whole day with an excuse that they’re attending to complaints and the BSNL exchanges in villages don’t have any in-house operator or receptionist to take complaints at the office or to deal with, which means the BSNL office stays shut with no linesmen free.”
Jose Costa tells Herald that the starred hotels from Varca to Mobor across Orlim, Carmona, Cavelossim and Benaulim all have dedicated in-house mobile towers and have no complaints or grouse with BSL while the locals don’t have any good mobile connectivity but the BSNL broadband people use is a complete letdown.
Similarly the people of Nuvem who face severe network issues are completely dependent on the BSNL wifi for their children to execute their college and school homework and projects but daily the Internet is down and no access to a cyber cafe makes it difficult for children to study and learn.
