My mother is a doctor and has been providing virtual consultations to her patients for the past few months. Everything was going fine until recently when her mobile signals went bad. Her mobile phone signals come and go. The signal bars on her mobile phone usually show one active bar which indicates weak signal strength. Most of the time, the mobile phone showed the ‘no signal’ sign. Later, my wife and I faced the same problem. We concluded that it wasn’t a technical fault. Following a string of complaints to our cellular service provider, we discovered that someone in our neighbourhood has installed GSM signal boosters. This installation disrupted network signals in the area and resulted in a massive drop in data speed.
What was even more shocking for me was to find out that the import, purchase and sale of such signal boosters is illegal in our country under the Pakistan Telecommunication (Re-Organisation) Act. However, for their personal benefits, some people are causing inconvenience to hundreds of people especially those who need to stay connected 24/7. Also, there are many shops in the city that are openly selling these boosters. The authorities are requested to look into this matter and take strict action against those people who are either buying or selling these boosters to ensure that citizens are not being deprived of digital connectivity.
Siraj Muneer Soomro
Karachi