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BSNL's net capacity drops 21% due to multiple Fibre cuts

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DQI Bureau
New Update

Telecom PSU BSNL said its Internet capacity has dropped by 21 per cent due to multiple fibre cuts in three under-sea cable systems that connect the country with many parts of the world.

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"... three major cables which are serving as the International Gateway Connectivity are affected because of the multiple fibre cuts," BSNL said in a statement.

"The Sea-Me-We-4, IMEWE and EIG cable systems are the ones affected.

Disruptions may be caused by outages, maintenance work on undersea cables connecting India to rest of world

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Internet services to be disrupted for next 2 weeks!

Communication services, especially data transmission, may be disrupted in the next two weeks because of outages and maintenance work on three undersea cables connecting India to the rest of the world.

India is linked to the global communication network through submarine cables that carry 90% of voice and data transmissions. The remaining 10% is transmitted through satellites.

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These submarine cables, which are several thousand kilometres long, are typically maintained and operated by a group of telecommunications companies, which in India include Bharti Airtel Ltd, Reliance Communications Ltd, Tata Communications Ltd and state-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL). Services on these fibre optic cables are sometimes disrupted if a cable is cut due to natural disasters such as earthquakes, or trawler fishing, shark bites, sabotage or theft.

 

The three submarine cables that have been affected go by the acronyms SMW4, IMEWE and EIG. India is connected internationally through eight major cable systems.

The Egyptian navy has arrested three scuba divers accused of cutting an undersea Internet cable off the coast of the northern city of Alexandria, news agency AFP reported on Thursday. The men said they were salvaging shipwrecks to sell when they spotted the cable and tried to take it.

The affected cable, known as the South East Asia-Middle East-West Europe 4 (SMW4), is an 18,800km communications line connecting Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Egypt, Italy, Tunisia, Algeria and France.

Similarly, the India-Middle East-Western Europe (IMEWE) is a 13,000km cable system between India and France. It has cable landing stations at Mumbai, Karachi, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon, Italy and France.

The third affected cable is the Europe India Gateway (EIG) system that is considered the first direct connection between India and the UK. It also connects Portugal, Gibraltar, Monaco, France, Libya, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Djibouti, Oman and the UAE.

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