May 3: There was a nationwide disruption in internet services on Thursday while the country marked the National Information and Communications Day as most of the internet services providers (ISPs) defaulted on their payment for bandwidth usage.

India’s Airtel stopped providing bandwidth to Nepal after the ISPs of Nepal failed to clear their dues for the usage of bandwidth provided by the Indian company.

Leading ISPs in Nepal, including WorldLink, Subisu, and Vianet, experienced disruptions in internet services since Thursday afternoon.

The Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA) has not allowed foreign exchange facility to the ISPs to pay for the bandwidth usage since a year after the ISPs did not pay the royalties as well as the dues they were liable to pay to the rural telecommunication development fees. The NTA argues that the ISPs have already collected the fees from their customers but have not paid the royalties and other charges to the regulatory body.

The Ministry of Communication and Information Technology gives the approval for foreign currency exchange to the ISPs upon the recommendation of the NTA. However, the ISPs have maintained their stance that they are not legally obliged to pay the royalties to the NTA and have defaulted on the payment. As a result, the ISP have not been able to pay the foreign company for the bandwidth usage.

The Internet Service Providers Association of Nepal (ISPAN)’s CEO Subash Khadka told New Business Age that Airtel stopped providing them with the bandwidth as they were unable to pay the dues to Airtel because the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology did not provide them with the foreign exchange facility.

“Airtel has completely stopped providing bandwidth to us. It had warned us earlier that it would stop the bandwidth,” he said.

According to Khadka, majority of ISPs of Nepal have acquired bandwidth service from India’s Airtel and Tata Sky.

However, Airtel is the only provider that has ceased offering bandwidth to ISPs in Nepal. Consequently, internet services in Nepal have slowed down significantly, if not come to a complete halt.

“Airtel provides sixty to seventy percent of bandwidth to Nepal,” said Khadka, adding that they have requested Airtel to continue providing the bandwidth after the disruption in services.

“We have written email to Airtel to give continuity to the service but we have not been able to assure the company of clearing the dues,” Khadka told New Business Age.

There have been contradictory statements regarding whether Airtel has completely ceased bandwidth supply to Nepali ISPs or has merely limited the service. While Khadka claims that Airtel has completely halted the service, former president of ISPAN Bhojraj Bhatta contends that Airtel has only limited the bandwidth service.

Meanwhile, WorldLink’s Director Laxman Yadav said Airtel has reduced the bandwidth supply by sixty percent.

“We are unable to pay to Airtel as the ministry has not given us foreign exchange facility,” said Yadav, adding, “That might be the reason they have reduced the bandwidth. We are in touch with Airtel to resolve the issue.”

Meanwhile, Bhatta claimed that Nepali ISPs have yet to pay more than INR 3 billion to the Indian companies.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology has said that its serious attention was drawn to the internet service disruption by some privately-owned internet service providers on the pretext that the government has not given then foreign exchange facility.    

Issuing a press statement this evening, the Ministry's Assistant Spokesperson Bishal Sapkota has urged all the internet service providers not to disrupt the essential service like internet.    

Issuing a statement on Thursday, the ministry also asked the ISPs to timely pay the rural telecommunications development fees and royalties to be paid to the state as per the law, which have been collected from the internet service users in advance. 

As per the law, ISPs need to pay 2 percent rural telecommunication development fee and 4 percent royalties from the internet fee they collect from their customers in advance.

The ministry claimed that out of 122 internet service providers and 23 network service providers registered with the Nepal Telecommunications Authority, only a handful of them have cleared the fees to be paid as per the laws.

The ministry also clarified that it has been regularly making recommendations for those who have cleared the dues for the foreign currency exchange facility upon the recommendation of the Nepal Telecommunications Authority.