The Times of India  29.11.2010

MUMBAI: Despite the growing clamour against illegally mushrooming mobile towers, which allegedly pose a hazard to the stability of rickety buildings as well as the health of their inhabitants, the BMC had approved the setting up of another 1,000 giant cellular towers in the last two years.

According to the BMC data, until 2007, there existed 1,628 illegal towers in the city. But, since then, the corporation cleared 1,107 more from the thousands of applications filed by mobile service providers in the period.

While there are no policy guidelines in place on setting up of cell towers atop residential buildings, members of the BMC's civic improvements committee - instead of discussing this aspect of the problem - went on needlessly debating the options the civic body now has in front of it: either bring the illegal towers down, or regularize them by charging a hefty fine.

However, both alternatives do not fit into BMC's current scheme of things. The municipality charges a ground rent to allow cell companies to set up security and control cabins for a tower coming up on its land.

In addition, it currently charges only Rs 5,000 to regularize those that have come up without permission on private or its own land. Then there's the handsome revenue societies get from the service providers as rent for the towers on residential buildings, sometimes in lakhs.

Now, cornered from all sides, the BMC finds itself in a fix. "By not demolishing them over the years, we have only allowed the problem to aggravate. We can't regularize so many with the paltry fine decided arbitrarily by civic officials in the past. The state needs to form a comprehensive policy. Until then, our hands are tied," said a senior BMC official.

The issue came to light recently when a notice of motion was moved by Kurla corporator Kamlakar Naik. In reply, BMC officials revealed, while action has been taken against 145 illegal towers and Rs 24,708 collected in fine, some 1,628 illegal towers are yet to be legalized. Members of the civic improvements committee on Monday demanded that all 1,628 unauthorized towers be razed under the MRTP Act or, if regularized, a hefty fine of Rs 1,00,000 be charged per tower.

"The BMC should immediately stop giving permissions to new towers until the state government formulates a policy for this and demolishes the illegal towers with immediate effect," said committee chairman Manoj Kotak.