SIALKOT, May 19: Refusing to budge from its stance on the fate of the Daska digital telephone exchange, the excise and taxation department officials have announced that several other exchanges, including the Sialkot central exchange, will also be sealed if the PTCL failed to pay its arrears.

The excise department claims that these exchanges owe it Rs7 million in the shape of arrears. It threatens to seal the exchanges in Sambrial, Bhopalwala, Uggoki, Pasrur, Chawinda and Badiana which, its officials say, also are the defaulters of the E&T department.

According to sources, the department has given a final deadline of May 25, 2006 for the payment of the dues.

As the Daska telephone exchange remained sealed for the fourth consecutive day on Friday, it faced heavy financial loss as its officials claimed that all the batteries were near end after which the entire exchange would become dead.

The excise department officials had sealed the 12,000-line Daska digital exchange owing to non-payment of arrears of Rs40,000. The tax was levied after the PTCL privatisation.

Meanwhile, thousands of telephone connections in Daska city had been lying dead because of damage to the PTCL Daska exchange underground main junction. The officials claim that the Tehsil Municipal Authority’s non-technical staff is responsible for the situation.

When contacted, the PTCL officials said they had tried their best to rectify the damaged system, but all the junctions were soaked by sewerage and damaged.

26 INJURED: Twenty-six people, including women and children, sustained injuries as the truck in which they were traveling fell into a seasonal nullah near Pasrur bypass in Daska city on Thursday night.