NTA announced that they will provide the additional frequency in the GSM band to support the operators provide quality service in the difficult situation after the mega quake on Baishak 12. The regulator to provide 4 MHz of unused frequencies in the 900 MHz bands to Nepal Telecom and Ncell, until the situation gets normal.
The mega-quake on Baishak 12 not only destroyed individual homes and heritage sites but also destroyed several telecom infrastructures like Mobile towers and Repeaters, due to which their mobile services in various districts are hit hard and made very difficult to restore. Also, the circuit usage of the subscribers will be overwhelmingly high to get in touch with their friends, families in such a panic situations.
NTA believes that the additional frequencies will help operators to restore their services and provide a congestion-free network. Though the operators now claim 90 percent restoration, there are still some areas with the service unavailability mainly in the remote areas.
Nepal telecom has been praised highly by the people in restoring their mobile network promptly after the earthquake even though the emergency preparedness for such a big disaster was not planned.
Apart from providing just the additional frequencies, NTA must direct or formulate policy to make the operators prepare for such a natural disasters and keep the communication system up and running.
