New Delhi: Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad announced this week that network providers could soon be penalised for the increased rate in call drops - a condition that is attributed to lack of spectrum and lesser mobile towers.
Despite the debate surrounding the low connectivity in a country which makes for one of the highest users of mobile phones, lot of people have expressed their disagreement to the installation of mobile towers, complaining about the radiation they emit.
In February 2015, Prasad said, “When people come with complaint about call drop on private mobile operators network what should I tell them? Private telecom operators need to ponder on this call drop. All this is because lack of spectrum, I'm sorry. I don't buy this.”
However, COAI director general Rajan S Mathews stressed that lack of spectrum is the main reason for call drops and India required a combination of more spectrum and more mobile towers to address the problem of mobile network connectivity.
Mathews said, “Hurdles posed by local government bodies to installing mobile towers citing radiation issues is another reason. Unless these issues are addressed, it will be difficult to resolve these problems.”
In April, Prasad called on all the telecom players to discuss the issue on call drops after he received letters from MPs and customers about the issue. Meanwhile, TRAI chairman Rahul Khullar announced that TRAI will be putting in a new set of benchmarks that would include stricter penal action against mobile operators who fail to adhere to the service quality levels.
He said, “Call drops problem is seen more in metros and less in smaller towns. If towers in places like Noida are switched off then how are you going to have wireless communication? This is what we have also mentioned in our broadband paper.”
In May, Prasad expressed urgency on addressing the issue and asked officials to come up with “an architecture of a disincentive to the telecom operators in case of call drops.” He reiterated that the EMF (electric and magnetic field) radiation scare is one big factor, which is affecting the quality. However, in order to address the issue of call drops, there is a need to install more BTS (base transceiver station) and consumers as well as activists need to understand this.
Assuring that the World Health Organisation has said that the towers are safe, Prasad said, “if new mobile towers are not allowed to be installed, then call drops shall surely happen. I would also like to say that these planned protests against installation of mobile towers are wrong and uncalled for."
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