The Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) is set to bridle the recalcitrant road cutters and has set up a separate department called Duct Services, which will have to permit underground cable laying.

Seeking such permission is mandatory. Besides, the cables should pass through ducts laid by the Palike.

Duct Services department has been set up at the Palike head office under the supervision of Special Commissioner (Administration) B S Ramprasad. Staff will be provided to the department soon.

The laying charges will be shared by the user company and the Palike on a 50:50 sharing basis. The fee collected from the companies at present is Rs 1,500 per meter.

In addition to this, the department is also planning to introduce maintenance charges for ducts called ‘Track Rent’ which companies will have to pay.

A pilot project is underway on Church Street where a single duct is being installed by the Palike as per the request of a software company.

The OFCs are required by companies for networking and connectivity. Computers and phone lines operate with the use of OFCs. Earlier companies adopted a method called horizontal direction drilling to dig roads and lay OFCs. This required re-laying of roads after digging which was a very cumbersome task for the Palike.

But now based on a existing Chennai model, the BBMP will provide underground ducts made of PVC pipes measuring 300 mm which will allow the optical fibre cables to pass through them easily.

These ducts will channelise proper placement of OFCs and avoid haphazard laying under the roads.