No review of emission norms, talks if evidence sound: Sibal

Government today said it will consider a dialogue with experts on the notification on guidelines on radiations from mobile phones and towers only if there is substantial evidence to prove the stipulated norms decided are not right.

"We have issued notification and if anybody has any concern we are willing to have dialogue. Why should I decide when we issued the notification there will be a review. The question does not arise," Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal told reporters at International Health Conference of Assocham.

Sibal added that if he finds "substantial, sound and sensible evidence to show what the government has decided is not right" then he will be open for talks.

"You can't ask for review merely because some experts don't agree with it," Sibal said.
The telecom minister said the expert group that recommended emission norms included representative from his ministry, Department of Biotechnology, Indian Council of Medical Research , Ministry of environment and Department of Science and Technology.
The government adopted recommendation of inter-ministerial group and notified it in November 2011.

Under these guidelines, DoT lowered the Specific Energy Absorption Rate (SAR) level to 1.6 Watt exposure to a mass of 1 gram of human tissue over a six minutes period .
This means that a the device should emit maximum of 1.6 watt of energy in body of mobile user over duration of six minutes while a person is using the mobile phone.
The SAR levels are fixed based on assumption that continuous exposure to mobile phone adversely effects body tissues that are in touch with device.

The new radiation norm issued by DoT also lowered limit of emission from telecom towers by one-tenth compared to earlier adopted levels.

Under the new guidelines, emissions from telecom antenna mounted on mobile towers should be equivalent to frequency range in which the antenna operates.

Like, an antenna operating in the frequency range of 400 Mhz will be allowed to emit 400 watt of energy per 2,000 square meter of area.

Earlier, the DoT had adopted International Commission On Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) guidelines where it fixed SAR at 2 Watt per kilogram in the frequency range of 10 MHz to 10 GHz.

Sibal during the event also read out excerpts from a report on the impact of use of mobile phones.

"Somewhere the report says that if you use your mobile phone for an average of 30 minutes then there are certain impact on that. If you use it for more than 30 minutes then impact is somewhat different," he said.