Airtel, Vodafone, Idea Cellular struggle to keep services going in flood-hit Chennai

Telecom operators including Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular and Vodafone are struggling to keep their services going amid unprecedented rainfall in Chennai and surrounding areas.

According to a statement issued on Thursday by the GSM industry body association COAI, the floods have caused severe damage to telecom infrastructure, thereby impacting networks across all operators in a huge way.

"Unavailability of grid power, water-logging resulting in submerged sites and unavailability of diesel in the absence of transportation have emerged as severe roadblocks towards network operations in the affected areas," the statement
said.

Operators are further facing problems in some areas in restoring operations due to non-accessibility by road in affected areas/sites. "The industry has requested assistance urgently from the government for restoration of grid power, availability of diesel and opening up of road access to flooded areas," the industry body said.

Meanwhile, telcos continue to offer freebies to their subscribers in the region.

Aircel is offering free 10 minutes Aircel to Aircel calls across India to all its Chennai customers for the next three days, Bharti Airtel has announced 'Talk Time' credit up to INR 30 for all Airtel pre-paid mobile customers.

Idea Cellular has started crediting 10 Local mobile minutes and 50 MB of 2G data in the prepaid accounts of 19.5 lakh customers in the five affected Districts of Chennai. Also Vodafone is offering pre-approved credit of Rs10 to all pre-paid customers and a credit of 10 minutes for Vodafone to Vodafone calling.