THARPARKAR district is spread over 19,638 square kilometres with a population of approximately one million. It has seven talukas; Chachro, Diplo, Mithi, Nagarparkar, Dhali, Islamkot and Kaloi, together having about 2,500 small and large villages.

High-speed and quality internet service is no more a luxury in a high-paced globalised and digitalised world where today most of our tasks are done in the virtual domain. The developing countries have been progressing in the field of science and technology. Embarrassingly, when the world community is exploring and deliberating about possibility of life on Mars, we are still struggling to provide quality and equitable education, and fast and smooth internet service.

After learning information technology (IT) and other such skills, freelancers in Tharparkar are selling their skills in the international market via various online marketplaces while using the internet.

Woefully, despite having potential to grow, these emerging freelancers and other people often feel frustrated when they face poor internet service. Owing to this situation, it takes 5-10 minutes to send even messages and downloading stuff on WhatsApp, voice and video calls are interrupted, while it takes several minutes to make a simple search on Google.

While people in this part of the country have been facing a myriad of issues for long, and freelancing has given them hope in this frustrating environment, slow internet has been compounding their problems.

Although two cellular service providers in the area are offering packages at high rates to their customers, they provide poor quality internet service across Tharparkar. As a result, subscribed packages go in vain, while telecommunication companies earn windfall profits.

In these testing times when there are hardly any job opportunities, selling skills online is a ray of hope for the freelancers. On the other hand, the government can also bring in foreign currency into the country by facilitating Tharparkar’s freelance community when the country is already short of foreign reserves.

The relevant authorities should hold these cellular companies accountable and ask them to ensure the provision of quality services to their customers for a smooth and gainful internet experience.

Dolat Chandani
Mithi

Published in Dawn, August 13th, 2022