Juhi Chawla Has Files A Petition In The Delhi HC Opposing The Roll-Out Of 5g Telecom Services

Background

• Actor and Environmentalist Juhi Chawla has moved a petition in the Delhi High Court seeking a scientific study against the rollout of 5G services in the country.
• Chawla seeks a scientific study on the adverse effects of radiofrequency emitted by cellular telecommunication using 5G technology on the health and life of humans as well as other living beings before its official roll out in the country.
• The petition will be taken up on 2nd June. The petition filed on Monday 31st May names 17 defendants including service providers, government organizations, the Indian Council of Medical Research and WHO among others.
• The petition filed by Chawla along with Veeresh Malik and TeenaVachani through Advocate Deepak Khosla seeks a direction to the Government and Science and Engineering Department to certify that 5G technology for cellular communication possesses no reasonable risk or hazard.
• The petition also urges the Central Pollution Control Board and Telecom Regulatory Authority of India to conduct a study on the issue.

Hazards of 5G

• According to World Health Organization, radiofrequency exposure levels from 5G technology can result in negligible temperature rise in the human body. The World Health Organization anticipates no other consequences.
• According to a report of Switzerland, short-term health impacts are absent and there’s also an absence of evidence of long term health effects are absent.
• However, the International Agency for Research of Cancer currently categorizes all radiofrequency radiations, including 5G as possibly carcinogenic.
• According to WHO, as long as the overall exposure remains under the international guidelines there is no anticipated risk to public health.

What Did The Petition State

• The plea stated that the State has a duty on the principle of ‘prevention is better than cure’ to scientifically test all the products of technology before they are made available to society at large.
• It cited the example of Brussels, which became the first city in the world to stop the rollout of 5G in April 2019 on account of health hazards.
• The petition stated that the 5G plans threaten to provoke serious and irreversible effects on humans and other living beings and will cause permanent damage to the Earth’s ecosystem.
• The plea also stated that if the telecommunication industry’s plan to roll out 5G comes to fruition, every living being will be exposed to radiofrequency radiation 24 hours a day, every day with no possibility to escape.
• It also brought to notice that there has been no response from the Ministry of telecommunications to the March 2019 RTI query. It stated that there has been no study conducted regarding Radio Frequency radiation even today.

What do you think of this Petition?