On Thursday evening, some parts of Nepal experienced an internet blackout for around five hours.
Why the internet outage?
Multiple private companies in Nepal source bandwidth from Indian companies. These Indian vendors, Airtel being one of them, stopped upstream services to Nepali private-sector internet service providers (ISPs) over non-payment of dues.
Consequently, the customers of these ISPs were ‘forced offline,’ leading to a communication crisis in parts of the country, said the Internet Service Providers Association of Nepal (ISPAN).
These internet providers owe approximately three billion Nepali rupees ($22.5 million) to Indian vendors.
Data from the internet outage monitor Netblocks showed that 18 internet providers based in Nepal had severely curtailed their bandwidth, with more than 10 million subscribers to these companies.
According to officials, Airtel agreed to restore the service after the Nepal Telecommunications Authority, the regulator, promised to ‘responsibly’ resolve the payment issue.
This action was taken after multiple verbal warnings. Last week, an Indian company wrote to Nepali ISPs to settle the dues immediately or face disruption of services.
However, Nepal’s government has refused to give the necessary approval to transfer the funds out of the country owing to the long-running dispute over taxes between Nepali ISPs and the government.
Nepal’s government states that internet providers must first clear their outstanding taxes, which the ISPs claim do not apply to them as decided by a former parliamentary committee and then by the government.
Earlier this week, WorldLink Communications Pvt Ltd, a major private sector ISP in Nepal, took to its X account to share the current problems faced by ISPs.
This is the current reality of the ISP industry in Nepal. It also highlights the challenges facing the ISP industry.https://t.co/lSXoyhwZPj #Nepal #ISPs #ISPAN
— WorldLink Communications Ltd. (@WLinkComm) April 28, 2024
“It may happen again. It is not in our hands; the government shall look into it”, ISPAN chief executive Suvash Khadka said in a press statement.
