Mysuru City Corporation sets 3-month deadline for service providers to pay fee and register 

Mysore/Mysuru: With lakhs of regular mobile phone users in Mysuru and surrounding areas, mobile service providers have been flooded with complaints on call drops.  To bridge this gap, service providers have started erecting many towers to support their signals. Unfortunately, the mobile towers came at the cost of Mysuru City Corporation (MCC). 

To cater to the demand, small lanes and street corners and roof of buildings are used to install towers and most of them do not have approval from the MCC. As per guidelines, it is mandatory for telecom operators to get consent from MCC before granting permissions for the construction of these towers.

In a notification issued to mobile operators, MCC Commissioner Gurudatta Hegde stated that all those service providers that are disseminating mobile signals within the limits of MCC including Airtel, Vodafone-Idea, Jio and BSNL have to obtain permission from the MCC for each of their towers. Three months have been granted for them to approach the MCC and obtain permission, the notification said. 

As per the Government order issued on May 29, 2019 and as per the guidelines issued by MCC Finance and Taxation Standing Committee and according to the decisions taken by the MCC Council, it is mandatory for mobile service providers to pay a fee to MCC and carryout business. As per the rules, the service providers have to pay a one-time fee of Rs. 50,000 for each tower. 

There are more than 400 towers in Mysuru city limits and as per the fee structure, the MCC must get revenue of Rs. 2 crore.“Tower operators have three months to submit the necessary documents for permission. The MCC will undertake a survey to identify all mobile towers and only those who have paid the fee will be allowed to operate and action will be taken as per law. Permit must be taken within the stipulated timeline of three months. There is no question of regularising them,” the Commissioner added.