Foreign equipment manufacturers following double standards

Telecom tower companies in last few months have been under scrutiny for possible health hazards of radio frequency exposure from mobile base stations, radiation and pollution.
Rajiv Mehrotra, president of Telecom Equipment Manufacturers Association (TEMA) and chairman and CEO of VNL said, "Foreign manufacturers who were implementing extremely low levels of radiation for their equipment in their countries were not using these technologies in the items they were selling to India."
While speaking at green telecom event he alleged that foreign manufacturers are following "double standards."
He said, "out of global pollution of 3.8 million tonnes, as much as 2.8 million tonnes was generated from India even though India had less number of cell phone subscribers."
Even the India government is considering issue of radiation from telecom towers quite seriously.  It will initiate a penal action against private cellular companies from November 15 this year, if radiation emanating from their towers is found violating internationally accepted norms.
The responsibility of monitoring the radiation levels of the estimated five lakh cell phone towers in the country to ensure that they are in conformity with the guidelines laid down by the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) to safeguard public health telecom towers has been entrusted to department of Telecommunication (DoT).
Union minister of state for communications Sachin Pilot had earlier said, "The violator companies will be fined Rs five lakh per tower and instructions for strict implementation of the radiation norms have been issued."
To roll out the process DoT has informed all the service providers to submit a self-certificate regarding radiation from their base transceiver station (BTS) by November 15, 2010 according to limits of radiation as prescribed by International Commission on Non-ionising Radiation Protection (ICNIRP).
If they fail to do so it would be treated as non-compliant to the radiation norms and penalty shall be imposed.
BTS are radio transmitters mounted on towers or roof tops to send radio waves into the area, around the base station.
Apart from DoT's initiative Union Environment and Forests Ministry has set up an Experts' Group to study the danger posed by telecom towers to the survival of birds and insects and propose remedial measures.
GSMA has also said it in its research paper that the global mobile communications industry encourages governments to adopt radio frequency (RF) exposure limits for mobile communications infrastructure that are based on the recommendations of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and the World Health Organization (WHO).