The Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation, which has close to 400 unauthorised mobile towers, is in the process of legalising them following a Bombay High Court order and a state government policy in this regard.
“The high court had directed that no coercive action should be taken by civic bodies against mobile towers that have been set up without permission. Similarly, the state government has also started the process of regularising the unauthorised mobile towers. And therefore PCMC too has initiated the process,” PCMC City Engineer Makrand Nikam told The Indian Express.
Collectively, Pimpri-Chinchwad has 916 mobile towers, most of them have come up in residential areas and on the terraces of cooperative housing societies who earn rent out of such mobile towers set up by mobile companies.
Nikam said the state government has set up a separate portal for mobile companies to seek permission for their mobile towers. “The mobile companies have to apply through such portals. After they fulfil the criteria, the civic bodies are granting permission to them. PCMC is also in the process of regularising such mobile towers which have come up without permission,” he said.
The portal set up by the state government, said Nikam, has come up as per the Central Government’s “New Right of Way Rules” which was notified in August, 2022. “The rules make it mandatory to have structural audit of the building where the mobile towers are being set up. The company desiring to set up mobile towers should submit us a certificate regarding the structural audit of the building. The building should be fit enough to house the mobile tower…Another criteria is that there should be no residential building within 20 metres of the mobile towers. We check the direction of the mobile tower after it is set up and only then permission is given,” Nikam said.
A senior PCMC officials said the mobile companies are not “wilful defaulters” as is being made out to be. “The Development Control Rules for civic bodies did not contain any rules and regulations for mobile towers when the mobile companies started setting up the towers. The rules came much later. And therefore those towers which were set up before the rules took effect are being considered as illegal. They will have to now seek permission from civic bodies and get their towers regularised,” the official said.
The state government took a decision to formulate a policy for setting up of mobile towers in 2012. The mobile companies then approached the Bombay High Court which asked the state government to formulate a policy, civic officials said.
Nikam said it is true that the rules came later. “But it does not mean they can operate without civic permission. The mobile companies will have to take requisite permission to stay operational legally,” he said.
Nikam said while granting permission for setting up of the mobile towers, a team of civic officials inspect the site where the tower is being or has been set up. “There are various criteria required to be followed by the companies while setting up of the towers. Once this is done, only then they get the permission,” he said.
On the revenue front, the mobile towers add crores to PCMC’s kitty by way of property tax. Assistant Municipal Commissioner Nilesh Deshmukh said PCMC collects property tax both for setting up both legal and illegal mobile towers amounting to around 18 crore annually. “We have 388 mobile towers counted as unauthorised while 528 are authorised ones…The old ones, like those set up in 2004, have less tax compared to the new ones,” he said.