Navi Mumbai: Corporators slam Reliance's proposal

Although the proposal for installating 126 towers for Reliance 4G services was cleared by the general body in April, it seems to have met with stiff resistance during a standing committee meeting. Corporators belonging to the ruling NCP strongly objected to the installation of such towers in public places.

Raising the matter during the meeting, NCP corporator Shivram Patil said, “We had cleared the proposal for installation of 126 Reliance towers in the city, in April. However, at the time of clearing the proposal, we were not given a list of the places where these towers would be erected. Today, I have the list and I am shocked to see these towers will be erected at 20 public gardens, 9 playgrounds, 17 island junctions and 25 dividers on the main road. These places see considerable movement of people and towers in such places can pose a health risk.”

Patil further alleged that the NMMC has not learnt its lessons from the past and is still keen on showering favours on industrial houses. “Reliance had promised us many things like the Amazing Park, but things have not worked out till date,” said Patil.

His colleague, Vikram Shinde, said, “Most housing societies today are dismantling towers owing to radiation scare and the many health hazards associated with it. However, we are going ahead and installing such towers in public places. It can pose a serious health risk for the residents of Navi Mumbai.”

Airoli corporator, MK Madhvi, said, “Other municipal corporations in the district have denied permission to Reliance for installation of towers.”

Congress corporator, Santosh Shetty, who was not allowed to speak on the subject during the meeting, later called up to inform, “Congress and Shiv Sena had opposed this proposal even during the general body meeting held on April 17, 2013. Then, NCP corporators had cleared this proposal. What happened today?” He added, “This is nothing but a tactic by the NCP to blackmail Reliance and extort money ahead of the elections.”

NCP’s Vaibhav Gaikwad has denied the allegations made by Shetty, saying, “The proposal for installation of Reliance towers was cleared unanimously. However, since the list of places where it is to be installed was not mentioned, we did not object then. Now that places are known, we would like to put it on record that such towers should not be installed at crowded places.”

He added, “This talk of extorting money ahead of elections is rubbish. The central government has granted licence to Reliance to roll out 4G services in the country and while doing so they had come out with a GR that such towers should be installed on government land and public places and we have congress government at centre.”

The general body of NMMC had cleared the road for laying of optical fibre cable (OFC) for Reliance 4G services, on April 17.

Towering woes
At the standing committee meeting, corporators belonging to the ruling NCP strongly objected to the installation of mobile towers in public places. Earlier, the proposal for installating 126 towers for Reliance 4G services had been cleared by the general body.

NCP Corporator Shivram Patil said, “Today, I have the list and I am shocked to see these towers will be erected at 20 public gardens, 9 playgrounds, 17 island junctions and 25 dividers on the main road. These places see considerable movement of people and towers in such places can pose a health risk

Congress corporator, Santosh Shetty, who was not allowed to speak on the subject during the meeting, later called up to inform that, “Congress and Shiv Sena had opposed this proposal even during the general body meeting held on April 17, 2013”.