Shourie to ring in mobile telephony

Union Telecommunication Minister Arun Shourie will formally launch mobile telephony in Srinagar tomorrow. Hundreds of Kashmiris queued up on...

Union Telecommunication Minister Arun Shourie will formally launch mobile telephony in Srinagar tomorrow. Hundreds of Kashmiris queued up on the second consecutive day today outside the Bakshi stadium to collect forms for cellphone connections.

The Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, which is, so far, the sole company to provide the facility in J-K, has shifted the form distribution counter from Central Telegraph Office to the stadium for security reason in the wake of heavy rush yesterday.

Keeping in view the Prime Minister’s promise of extending the facility to the state this week, BSNL sources said Shourie would make a call to Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed to inaugurate the operation. The BSNL authorities, it is learnt, have also decided to provide 13,000 connections each in Srinagar and Jammu as against the 5,000 stated earlier.

The BSNL will distribute 20,000 forms each in the twin cities and reject 7,000 through a lottery system. The company had asked prospective subscribers to affix either passport, driving licence or PAN number and not ration cards with the form since a lot of cross-checking is involved in the first three and the authorities want to ensure that the cellphones don’t land in wrong hands. Sources said the security agencies would be monitoring the operations.

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