Business Line
  
New Delhi, Aug 24: The Department of Telecom does not want children below 16 years to own a mobile phone. As per draft guidelines for complying with limits for human exposure to electromagnetic fields prepared by the Telecommunication Engineering Centre - the technical wing of the DoT - mobile operators will be asked to discourage children from taking a connection. The reason: Mobile phones radiate electromagnetic energy that heats up the tissues, which may cause health hazards.

“The tissues of children are tender and therefore they are likely to be more affected by use of mobile phones. Children below 16 years age should be discouraged from using mobile phones,” says the draft guidelines. The TEC has also suggested putting stringent norms for rolling out base stations and antennas, including asking operators to install radio base stations away from schools and hospitals.

“In India, the growth of mobile telephones is very high. Consequently, this may result in large number of installation of base station antennas on towers serving very large number of mobile telephones. Under such scenario, the intensity of cumulative effect of electromagnetic fields present may be appreciable and may cause undesired effects on human beings. In order to safeguard humans against the possible undesired effects of electromagnetic radiations, there is immediate need for issuing the guidelines,” the TEC proposal says.

The mobile operators are opposing the proposals. “Any over-precautionary approach, or statement lacking scientific evidence can impede the growth of cellular mobile telephony in the country. It is pertinent to mention that there is over five decades of research (1,700 studies on biological and health effects of radio frequency fields and 400 studies on biological and health effects of mobile communication radio frequencies).

“The general consensus of these studies is that there is no conclusive and definitive evidence of established effects on health at exposure levels below the safety limits prescribed by various international bodies and endorsed by WHO,” said the Cellular Operators Association of India.

However, DoT sources pointed that WHO has suggested adoption of a precautionary approach. Many countries such as Canada, the US, European Union, Australia, Japan and China have accepted and implemented this precautionary approach in different forms, said the official.