New Delhi:
Though it's still unclear if there is any connection between cellphone radiation and it's adverse impact on human health, the government is set to roll out its new norms on cellphone radiation. Starting tomorrow, new radiation norms for mobile phone towers and mobile handsets will come into effect.
Mobile Towers:
- Under it, the new limit will be one tenth the existing exposure level for all mobile phone towers across the country.
- Service providers will have to give self-certifications on these norms showing that they comply with the prescribed limit.
- The telecom enforcement resource and monitoring cells will conduct random checks. Any company found in violation will have to pay a penalty of Rs 5 lakh per tower.
- With these new norms, Indian standards will now be 10 times more stringent than 90 per cent of countries across the globe.
Mobile handsets:
- Any new handset manufactured in India or imported into the country from tomorrow will have to confirm to the new norms.
- The new norm has been set at 1.6 W/kg over 1 gram of human tissue. Earlier it was 2W/ kg over 10 gram of human tissue.
- Existing handsets, which do not comply with these norms, can be used, but will have to be phased out till the end of August 2013.
- All handsets will also have to display their exposure limit on the handset just like it's done in the case of IMEI number.
- All cell phone handsets will have to comply with the new norms and shall be available in hands free mode.
- The government is also setting up a test laboratory in the telecom engineering centre (TEC) for testing of SAR value of mobile handsets.