They denied reports of damaging 20,000 SIM cards of Teletalk mobile phones and said 2,000 SIM cards have so far been distributed against 10,000 forms.

The sudden suspension of distribution of forms was the outcome of a hasty launch of the mobile phone in time with insufficient manpower, particularly in sales and marketing, they said.

The project is suffering from a lack of coordination between BTTB and the authorised branches of the BASIC Bank.

Teletalk authorities were not prepared as they could not anticipate such a huge customer response, sources said.

Hundreds of customers, meanwhile, waited in long queues in the city's four booths of the BASIC Bank and collected SIM cards against their forms delivered during the last two days.