Internet services were disrupted in parts of Islamabad and Rawalpindi on Sunday, September 27, after fiber optic cable cuts in the Taxila and Gujar Khan area affected network connectivity across the twin cities. Federal Minister for IT and Telecommunication Shaza Fatima Khawaja confirmed the incident, saying a dual fiber cut in the general area of Taxila and Gujar Khan had impacted services in Rawalpindi and Islamabad. The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority also confirmed the disruption, stating that the cable cut occurred on the network of one telecom operator and caused partial service issues for some other providers as well.
Users began reporting problems on both fixed broadband and mobile data from around mid morning, with reports naming several of the country’s major providers, including Jazz, Ufone, Zong, Telenor, and PTCL, though the full list could not be confirmed with PTA or the companies themselves. Many customers were unable to access mobile data services during the disruption, and the outage also affected mobile banking and digital payment applications, including Easypaisa and JazzCash, with users reporting difficulty accessing these services while connectivity remained down. Several social media platforms, websites, and other online applications were also affected, and the cause of the disruption was not immediately clear when the outage was first reported.
PTA said the disruption was limited to certain local and surrounding areas of the twin cities, while internet services in the central and southern parts of the country continued to operate normally and some areas in the northern region were also affected. The regulator advised residents not to be concerned about the partial outage, saying technical teams had been mobilized to repair the damaged optical fiber cable and restore services as soon as possible. PTA did not name the operator whose network was affected in its published statement. Because operators typically share fiber routes or lease capacity from one another, a single cable cut on one company’s network can slow down the customers of several providers at the same time, which helps explain why users across different networks reported problems.
In her update on the situation, Minister Khawaja said one of the two damaged sites had been repaired, resulting in the restoration of most affected services, while repair work on the second site was still underway. Later reports indicated that internet services were fully restored in Islamabad and Rawalpindi after the fault was repaired, though this could not be independently confirmed on PTA’s own channels at the time of writing. The incident was a local cable fault, distinct from the SMW5 submarine cable fault in July 2026, which PTA said had disrupted international internet traffic before confirming full restoration a day later. Sunday’s disruption highlights how dependent everyday digital services, from mobile data to payment applications, remain on physical fiber infrastructure, and how quickly damage to a limited number of cable routes can affect connectivity for a large number of users across multiple networks in the capital region.
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