Ending the Indian telecom’s monopoly over supply of internet bandwidth in Nepal, Friday Nepal opened an optical fiber link across the Himalayas for new internet bandwidth from China. The program was inaugurated by information minister Mohan Bahadur Basnet. China Telecom Global is managing the operations and management of the internet line that extends from Kathmandu to the border point Rasuwagadhi into the Tibet region. The internet access is connected via Hong Kong bandwidth, which is not restricted by the infamous “Great Firewall”. The average internet connection speed is estimate to be of 3.8 Mbps that is mostly targeted for the city’s and hubs areas.
In the past Various Indian Telecoms like Airtel and Tata Communications had monopolized the internet access through the cities of Bhairahawa, Biratnagar and Birgunj in southern Nepal.
The link was scheduled to be up and running by the middle of last year but it was delayed due to the difficulties of working at high altitudes above 4,000 metres.
In December 2016, NT had reached an agreement with China Telecom to acquire internet bandwidth. NT had begun the test transmission of the project from the first week of September last year.
