India will implement stricter radiation emission norms from September 1 for mobile towers to reduce emission to one-tenth of present levels. Failure to stick to prescribed radiation levels
will attract penalties of 5 lakh per tower. Radiation absorption norms
for mobile handsets have been made more stringent, but cellphone makers
have been given a year to comply with new norms.
Telecoms minister Kapil Sibal
said on Friday that the new radiation exposure limits from towers were
10 times more stringent than those adopted by 90% of the world and
telcos were bound to comply from Saturday.
"Now with more
stringent rules, we want to make sure that there is no violation. We
told them to make required changes in all areas to meet new emission
norms immediately," the minister said.
Mobile phone
companies would have to provide self-certification of compliance with
the new norms and register with the telecom enforcement resource &
monitoring (Term) cells. Term cells would conduct random audits and in
case of complaints. The telecom department can impose a fine of 5 lakh
per tower per telco if the rules are flouted.
Tougher norms ask
tower providers to avoid installing base station antennas in lanes
narrower than 5 meters while totally restricting roof top towers with
multiple antennas. To safeguard consumers, telcos will have to maintain
distance from a building, depending on the number of antennae they want
to put.
For instance, a building should be 75 meters away from a
tower that has 12 antennas. A tower with only two antennas can be 35
meters away. DoT has also proposed to set up state and district telecom
committees for reviewing infrastructure related issues at both levels.
Telecoms secretary R Chandrasekhar, however, said 95% of nearly 500,000
towers across the country were already adhering to the high standards.
Source:-The Economic Times
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