Himalayan News Service

Kathmandu, March 14:

The Nepal Telecom is to begin re-registration of mobile phones at its 10 different outlets, including the New Services Directorate at Pulchowk, from tomorrow. Though the customers are required to re-register their names by Saturday, it was not known when the service would resume. “We cannot say right away when the mobile service would be resumed; we have begun the process of re-registration,” Madan Kaji Shrestha, Director of the New Services Directorate, told this daily.

He further said: “We will hold discussions on security arrangements with the security bodies before restarting the service.” According to the Directorate, some 71,997 mobile users starting with numbers 9851020000-9851040000, 9851040001-9851059000, 9851059001-9851078000, 9851078001-9851092000 will re-register their phones from Tuesday through Friday. Users failing to re-register their mobile phones on the specified days could do the same on Saturday. One must be grateful to the telecom authorities for starting the process. Temporary shut-down of mobile services has caused a loss of revenue to the tune of over Rs 60 million a month to the exchequer, whereas the New Services Directorate has been incurring a loss of Rs 190 million every month, sources at the Directorate told The Himalayan Times. Of the total revenue, 59 per cent goes to the government — 25 per cent as tax, 6 per cent rural fund, 13 per cent Value Added Tax and 15 per cent as service charge. Meanwhile, the telecom authorities said they are “desperately waiting for the resumption of the mobile service.” While no one dared to talk on record, constant refrain was “we pay 25 per cent of the gross profit to the government as tax.”