Allowed

Reliance Infratel Limited v. State of Chhattisgarh and Ors.

Chhattisgarh HC7 Dec 2017WPC/5297/2009

Case brief

AI extract

What is this about?

Chhattisgarh High Court quashed an order restricting a petitioner telecom company from installing a mobile tower. The Court held there was no scientific evidence linking EMF from towers to health hazards, citing superior precedent and WHO guidelines, and allowed the writ petition.

What did the court decide?

Impugned order set aside; writ petition allowed; parties to bear their own costs.

Reliance Infratel Limited Vs State of… — Service and Employment | Chhattisgarh HC (2017)

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AFR

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HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH, BILASPUR Writ Petition (C) No. 5297 of 2009

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Reliance Infratel Limited, a Company incorporate and registered under Indian Companies Act, 1956 having its registered office at Block-H, First Floor, Dhirubhai Ambani Knowledge City, Navi Mumbai 400 710, inter alia circle office at circle head office at Ashoka Millennium, Ring Road No.1, Raipur (Chhattisgarh).

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---Petitioner

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Versus

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1.State of Chhattisgarh, through : The Secretary, Revenue, D.K.S. Bhawan, Mantralaya, Raipur (Chhattisgarh).

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2.S. D. O., Dondilohara, District – Durg (Chhattisgarh).

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3.Nagar Panchayat, Chikhalakasa, Through : Its Secretary, P.C. No. 22, Tahsil – Balod, District – Durg (Chhattisgarh).

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4.Paul Vergies, Counselor Indira Colony, Village – Chikhalakasa, Dallirajhara, District – Durg (Chhattisgarh).

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5.Raj Kumar Sharma, Indira Colony, Village – Chikhalakasa, Dallirajhara, District – Durg (Chhattisgarh).

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6.P.M. George, Residence of Rajkumar Sharma, Indira Colony, Village – Chikhalakasa, Dallirajhara, District – Durg (Chhattisgarh).

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7.S. Rajkumar @ Raja, Indira Colony, Village – Chikhalakasa, Dallirajhara, District – Durg (Chhattisgarh).

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---Respondents

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For petitioner : Mr. Sachin Singh Rajput, Advocate. For respondents/State : Mr. Dheeraj Wankhede, Govt. Advocate. For respondent - 4 to 7 : Mr. J. N. Nande, Advocate.

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Hon’ble Shri Justice Sanjay K. Agrawal

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Order on Board

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07.12.2017

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1. Petitioner herein calls in question legality, validity and correctness of order dated 06.08.2009 passed by Sub-Divisional

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Officer, Dondilohara by which said officer has allowed the application filed by respondent No.4 restraining the petitioner herein from installing its mobile transmission tower over the subject land on the ground that such an installation would be injurious to health of citizens.

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2 . Mr. Sachin Singh Rajput, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner, would submit that such an order passed by learned SubDivisional Officer is contrary to the facts and law available on the record. He would further submit that the decision of Kerala High Court in the matter of Reliance INFOCOM Ltd. v. Chemanchery Grama Panchayat and others 1, the decision of Himachal Pradesh High Court in the matter of Vijay Verma and others v. State of Himachal Pradesh and others 2 and the decision of Delhi High Court in the matter of Kapil Choudhary and others v. Union of India and others 3 on the point in dispute has not been considered by the learned Sub-Divisional Officer in which it has clearly been held that installation of mobile phone towers and emission of waves by the said towers is not in any way harmful for the health and hazardous to the health of citizens.

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3 . On the other hand, learned counsel appearing for the respondents would support the impugned order.

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4 . I have heard learned counsel for the parties and considered their rival submissions made herein-above and gone through the

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1 AIR 2007 Kerala 33

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2 2015 SCC OnLine HP 2722

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3 2016 SCC OnLine Del 2558

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record with utmost circumspection.

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5 . In Kapil Choudhary (supra), the Union of India has filed an affidavit which has been quoted by Delhi High Court in the said judgment which states as under:-

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“8. The counter affidavit, on the other hand, has placed on record detailed facts to demonstrate that radiations from mobile phone tower are not known to have any adverse health effect. Some of the relevant portion of the counteraffidavit reads as follows:-

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“16. ….WHO has referred to approximately 25,000 studies, conducted around the world over past 30 years, and based on an in-depth review of scientific literature, has concluded: “current evidence does not confirm the existence of any health consequences from exposure to low level electromagnetic fields”. …

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That with reference to Electromagnetic Radiation emanating from cellular mobile towers, World Health Organization (WHO) in its Fact Sheet No. 304, May 2006 on electromagnetic Fields and Public Health (Base Stations and Wireless Technologies) has concluded that “considering the very low exposure levels and research results collected to date, there is no convincing scientific evidence that the weak RF Signals from base stations and wireless networks caused adverse health effects. From all evidence accumulated so far, no adverse short or long term health effects have been shown to occur from the RF Signals produced by based stations.”

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6 . Similarly, the Kerala High Court in Reliance INFOCOM Ltd.

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(supra) has held that panchayat had no scientific data or relevant material to cancel the license already granted on the ground that the installation of the tower would cause any health hazard. Based on the same, the writ petition was allowed. Reference may be had to the following observation of the court:-

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“2. …… The above issue came up for consideration

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before a Division Bench of the Bombay High Court in WP No. 2112 of 2004. The Bench directed the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India to conduct a scientific study on the issue. The ministry of Health and Family Welfare on the direction of the Bombay High Court constituted a Committee under the Chairmanship of Dr. N.K. Ganguly, DG ICMR to evaluate the following aspects.

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Whether it is advisable to frame and/or adopt international guidelines pertaining to installation of Base Stations by mobile telephone service providers, so as to avoid any potential risk to health and safety to public at large.

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Explore the possibility for studying the course of action and framing a research project.

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Report submitted before the Bombay High Court was made available by Shri. Santhosh Mathew, Advocate which gave us considerable scientific insight for resolving the problem posed before us. Petitioner has also stated that the experiments conducted in and around BTS towers at points where the public is likely to be exposed has proven that emission at these points are 150,000 times below the level at which significant heating can occur. Petitioner has also produced a chart showing a comparison between mobile base station and other sources of radio frequency which stated that 200 microwatts is the safe exposure limit set by different regulatory bodies. Petitioner has made a comparison of power density (Microwatts/sq.cm.) between AM Radio, FM Radio, Mobile Base Station, UHF TV, VHF TV, Paging Services etc. and submitting that radiation from the Mobile Base Station is less compared to that of AM Radio and FM Radio. Atomic Energy Regulatory Board also submitted a report before the Bombay High Court in WP No. 2112 of 2004. Report states that radio frequency waves used for mobile phones are not covered under the definition of “radiation” as given in the Atomic Energy Act, 1962 and non-ionizing radiations do not have the capability to ionize the matter with which they interact. Radiation Protection Division (NRPB) of the U.K. Health Protection Agency in the year 2000 has reported that the balance of evidence indicates that there is no general risk to the health of people living near the base stations on the basis that exposures are expected to be small fractions of guidelines. Scientific data made available to the Court would indicate that the use of mobile phone, AM Radio, FM Radio etc. is more harmful to the human

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beings compared to the power emission from the base Transcieving Stations and that of Mobile Towers. Surveys conducted in proximity to base stations indicate that the public is exposed to extremely low intensity RF fields in the environment and all the evidence indicates that they are unlikely to pose a risk to health. We may in this connection also refer to the order of the Delhi High Court in OS 1121/02 wherein the court opined that so far there is neither any conclusive research nor authoritative scientific evidence to show that the radiations emitted by such Transmission Towers are dangerous to the health of human beings.”

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7 . A Division Bench of the Gujarat High Court in the case of Muktipark Co-operative Society v. Ahmedabad Municipal

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Corporation 4, which was also filed in public interest by local residents claiming that the installation of WiFi mobile towers was in violation of the guidelines issued by Union of India and is likely to cause a potential health threat due to the emission of radio-active waves from the said towers, relying upon the above-noted judgment of the Kerala High Court further held as follows:-

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“19. Based on such recommendations of the InterMinisterial Committee, the Government of India has now adopted stricter norms for emission from the base stations, being 1/10th of the limits prescribed by ICNIRP. Accordingly, the licence conditions of all the telecom service providers in India were again amended to this effect. The letter dated 26.6.2013 issued by the DoT refers to the amendment made to the Licence Agreements in this regard.

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The DoT has thereafter issued guidelines effective from 1.8.2013, which, inter alia, reflect the adoption of 1/10th of the limits prescribed by ICNIRP. The comparative table given in the reply of the respondent no. 2 and also reproduced hereinbelow gives the norms prevalent in India as against those prescribed by the ICNIRP:

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4 SCA No. 5548 of 2014, Gujarat High Court

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Frequency (in Mega Hertz or MHz)	Power Density Limit prescribed by ICNIRP (in Watt/meter2 or W/m2)	Power Density Limit prescribed by DoT (in Watt/meter2 or W/m2)
900	4.5	0.45
1800	9	0.9
2100 and above	10.5	1

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8 . The Delhi High Court in Kapil Choudhary (supra) after discussion and taking of the affidavit filed by Union of India held as

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under:-

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“12. In view of the above, it is clear that there is no scientific data available to show that installation of mobile phone towers and the emission of the waves by the said towers is in any way harmful for the health or hazardous to the health of citizens. There is no conclusive data to the said effect. The petitioner has not been able to produce any data whatsoever showing any such harmful effects on the health of human beings. The petitioner has also not been able to show violation of any norms by the respondent.”

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9 . Recently, the Himachal Pradesh High Court in Vijay Verma

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(supra) has considered the issue and held as under:-

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“17. It is evident from the perusal of the aforesaid reports that the exposures to electromagnetic fields (EMF) do not have any notable effect on the health of human beings. Evidently, the studies conducted till date by the two premier organizations i.e. WHO and SCENIHR go to indicate that despite a large number of studies having been carried out for the last two decades to assess the potential health risk on account of emission of EMF, no major adverse health effect has been noticed.

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What in fact emerges is that radio frequency radiation from the mobile towers and phones are in minuscule range and is lakhs of time weaker than X-rays or UV rays or even normal visible light. In fact, so low that they simply cannot cause any disturbance of electrons in the basic atoms of matter or living tissue and hence classified as “non-ionising radiation”.

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Radiation in itself is nothing new and has been there since life began on earth three and a half billion years

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ago. Radiation is all around us and we are all actually submerged in naturally occurring ionizing radiation reaching us from the outer space, even from the radioactive elements and materials around us. Sun shine in itself is a familiar form of radiation.

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We in view of the overwhelming material are of the considered view that as of now there is no cause of alarm with regard to the possible ill-effect on human health by electromagnetic Field (EMF radiation) from mobile phone towers and mobile phones because the limits adopted in India cannot have any biological effect on human. In fact, the limits set by India are much lower than the internationally adopted recommendations of the International Commission of Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) which account for thermal and nonthermal effect.

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There is no conclusive evidence as on date which may have found any adverse health effect by EMF radiation from the mobile tower or mobile hand set by the WHO or SCENIHR and so long as EMP radiation power level in vicinity of Mobile Base Stations is below the prescribed limits, there should not be any cause or concern for adverse thermal effect on human beings living close to Mobile Base Station or in the nearby vicinity.

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Now in teeth of the report submitted by the WHO and another report submitted by the SCENIHR, the individual opinions relied upon by the petitioners to claim that the EMF radiations from the Mobile Base Stations are source of health hazard, for the time being, can conveniently be brushed aside as having no scientific backing whatsoever and therefore, any such reports relied upon by the petitioners shall have to give way to the opinion rendered by the WHO and SCENIHR. However, it appears that some myths are being spread and circulated simply in order to create fear amongst the people, but then as aptly said by Nobel laureate Marie Curie that “Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.”

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In view of the aforesaid discussion, we find no merit in these petitions and the same are accordingly dismissed, leaving the parties to bear their costs.”

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10 . In view of the aforesaid analysis and going through the impugned order, it is quite vivid that there is no scientific data available on record to demonstrate that the installation of mobile

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phone towers and emission of waves by the said towers in any way injurious to the health of citizens. Respondent No.4 has failed to establish by placing reliable data and material showing any harmful effect on the health of human beings from such mobile transmission tower, as such learned Magistrate is absolutely unjustified in granting such application without any scientific and reliable data in that regard.

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11 . As a fallout and consequence of aforesaid discussion, the impugned order is set aside and the writ petition is allowed leaving the parties to bear their own cost(s).

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Sd/(Sanjay K. Agrawal) Judge

Reliance Infratel Limited v. State of Chhattisgarh and Ors.

Case brief

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Reliance Infratel Limited v. State of Chhattisgarh and Ors.

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