After more than four-and-a-half months of suspension, the Indian government restored text messaging services in occupied Kashmir.
The SMS services were restored in government-run hospitals on Tuesday midnight along with broadband internet services. Local government spokesman Rohit Kansal said the decision was made after assessing the situation.
“The decision was made to restore internet connectivity to all government hospitals with effect from midnight on December 31, in addition to fully restore SMS on mobile phones,” he quoted sources.
However, in Kashmir, internet and mobile prepaid services are still to be restored. On October 14, the government restored post-paid services after which some 4 million post-paid mobile phones went into operation in occupied Kashmir.
Read More: India restores incoming SMS in occupied Kashmir, internet still cut
Since August 5, an Indian government curfew has been in effect in IoK, which has also suspended the region’s landline and internet services. On August 17, out of just over 100 telephone exchanges in IoK, landline networks in 17 were made operational.
Such exchanges took place primarily in the area of civil lines, the Srinagar district airport and the area of Cantoment. In Jammu, Reasi, Samba, Kathua and Udhampur districts, 2G mobile internet services were also restored.