BENGALURU: THE Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has warned telecom service providers that their mobile towers will be removed if they do not pay the one-time fee and get their towers regularised in the next 15 days.
According to guidelines issued by the Urban Development Department, a telecom service providers has to pay a permission fee, which varies from place to place, for installing a mobile tower.
Within BBMP limits, the fee is `50,000, corporation limits: `40,000, City Municipal Councils: `30,000, Town Municipal Councils: Rs 20,000, Town Panchayats Rs 15,000 and for Gram Panchayats, it is Rs 10,000.
BBMP officials have estimated that there are at least 10,000 mobile towers in their limits, but permission fees have been paid for hardly 200 of them.
“We had called a meeting with the telecom service providers a few days back. We have instructed them to give the list of mobile towers that they have installed,’’ M K Gunashekar, Chairman, BBMP Standing Committee for Taxation and Finance, said.So far, only one service provider has come forward with its list.
“After the 15-day deadline, if the towers are not regularised, they will be removed. We are not responsible for any signal problems later,” he said.
He also said some service providers have asked them for an online payment system and the civic agency is making an arrangement regarding this. On optical fibre cable, Gunashekar said they have made provision for duct to lay the cables in all TenderSURE roads.
“But telecom service providers are stringing OFCs on trees and on either side of roads. Even on normal roads, OFCs hang on trees. They have to pay a fee of Rs 1,500 per metre once in 15 years and Rs 800 per metre, which is refundable. Some telecom service providers have declared only 800 km to 2,000 km, but the city has 14,000 km roads and most places have OFCs. “We have instructed our officials to file FIR against service providers if they have not taken permission. We are removing them too,’’ he said.