At least seven families of Madhya Badda area alleged that they have received such inflated telephone bills ranging from Tk 3,000 to 18,000 for the month of November last year whereas their bills usually did not cross Tk 1,000 per month previously. A number of subscribers in Bakshi Bazar made similar complaints.

"I have been using the land phone for the last eight years and paying Tk 400-600 as monthly bill, but in November last year I received a bill of Tk 16,705," said Kazi Mozammel Haque of Madhya Badda, a former assistant engineer of BTTB.

Haque said he made no NWD or ISD calls in the last one year. "I went to the divisional engineer at Gulshan Telephone Exchange to lodge complaint, but he did not receive my application saying fake billing is not possible in digital system," he said.

Sheikh Nazruzzaman, another victim of the ghostly bill, said he paid the highest Tk 2,215 for a single month since he took connection several years ago. "I was simply thundered to see the bill of Tk 17,605 in November though I did not make any NWD or ISD call. But the BTTB officials said they have nothing to do with the problem," he said.

Nazruzzaman said the linemen are responsible for the fake billing. They connect one subscriber's line to other's -- sometimes the lines of residential houses are disconnected and diverted to phone/fax shops for several days. Bribing the linemen, the phone shop owners use those lines but the subscribers concerned have to pay the bills.

Narrating his experience, Nazruzzaman said almost every month his telephone line remains disconnected for several days and he has to pay the linemen for restoring the connection.

"The linemen run the illegal business to make money with the help of the switchmen," he said, adding that a lineman was also suspended after he was caught red-handed a few months back. "But the situation has not changed, the public suffering is worsening day by day."

When contacted, Mohammad Nasiruddin, director (revenue) at Sher-e-Bangla Nagar exchange, said fake billing is not possible in the digital telephone billing system.

He however admitted that there are hundreds of such complaints of extra billing. "But we don't know how to resolve it," the official said.

The only solution is keeping the telephone sets locked so that others cannot use the line for NWD or ISD calls without the knowledge of the customer, he said, adding that the clients could get their call details if they apply to the authorities.

About the ghostly bills received by some subscribers, Mohammad Nasiruddin said: "They must pay the bills that they have received."