LAHORE – The Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB) has suspended free WiFi facility at public places in various cities of Punjab, citing lack of funds, on Tuesday.
According to the sources in Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB) said: “The project was started in association with the Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL), but the government has failed to pay dues worth over Rs150 million.” They added that another Rs190 million was needed to keep the service running, however, the government has discontinued the project terming it as a “burden on the exchequer.”
According to the sources, the new budget did not have any allocation for the project, adding that employees working on the project have also been suspended.
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The PITB was providing the free internet facility was set up for the masses at educational and government buildings, public parks, markets, hospitals, railway stations, airports and bus stations at over 200 points in Lahore, Multan, Faisalabad, Bahawalpur. The project was later extended to Rawalpindi and Multan as well.
The suspension of the facility has caused a lot of difficulties for citizens, especially university and college students who had been benefitting from the facility on daily basis. The facility was also available to the journalists at the Lahore Press Club.
The users were authenticated by their ID and mobile numbers, after which they received a code via SMS to connect to the internet. Video streaming and downloading were banned in order to maintain a positive usage of these facilities whereas time and location logs were maintained for security purposes. Each hotspot has a screen which displayed a total number of users connected, bandwidth and usage statistics.
Trained staff was available at the call centre 24/7 to ensure technical support and complaint handling and resolution.
The PITB started the project in 2017, providing free WiFi facility at public places for the last two years. The PITB usage data statistics of Punjab Wi-Fi showed that over 1,400,000 people had subscribed to the free WiFi service.
