Tower of worry
Dear Sir,
A GSM tower is being installed adjacent to our apartment in the Muntazah area just opposite to the Central Tender Committee building. We don’t know whom the tower belongs to. We have seen such towers being installed elsewhere in the city. One of them is there near the Family Food Centre shop in Old Airport Area. But no houses are close to that tower.
But our area is densely inhabited and all around the tower are apartment buildings. The plot where it is being installed is vacant and measures just around 50sq m. The tower is just 3m away from my bedroom.
Interestingly enough, the power supply to the tower is not met from Kahramaa but from a generator. The constant sound from the generator is annoying. We can hardly get any sleep during night or day as it works round the clock.
The buildings on the other three sides of the tower are at about 10-15m away from it. Besides the radiation effect of the transmitter, the sound and air pollution created by the generator and its carbon and smoke emission is so enormous that in the mornings the entire surrounding areas remain dark and we can’t open the windows even for a second.
Although there are spots available within a radius of 200m, we fail to understand why the tower is installed near our apartment building. In the long-run we fear this may pose a serious health hazard to us.
We, therefore, invite immediate intervention of health, municipality and telecom authorities to get the tower shifted from our neighbourhood.
EGA, (Full name and address supplied)
An academic and a philanthropist
Dear Sir,
Sarala Birla, wife of Birla group patriarch Basant Kumar Birla, breathed her last on the morning of March 28, at the family’s Delhi residence. She was 91 and survived by husband B K Birla, daughters Jayshree Mohta and Manjushree Khaitan and grandson Kumar Mangalam Birla.
Born at Kuchhaman in Rajasthan on November 23, 1924, to Brijlal Biyani, a freedom fighter, and Savitri Devi Biyani, Sarala Birla had an extraordinary upbringing. She studied in a government school, which was rare for a Marwari girl of her time, and went on to study at the prestigious Fergusson College in Pune.
She was an accomplished academic, a philanthropist and pragmatist. Sarala Birla’s focus was on education. Along with her husband, B K Birla, she laid the foundations of around 45 educational institutions such as the Birla Institute of Technology & Science, the Ashok Hall Group of Schools, Mahadevi Birla World Academy, GD Birla Centre for Education and BK Birla Institute of Engineering & Technology.
Doha’s Birla Public School is the pioneer institute abroad founded by the Birlas.
I had been in touch with her right from 1991 when I started my career as a teacher. I once attended a meeting in Kolkata where she gave a speech highlighting the role of a teacher. It inspired me so much that today I can assure myself to have accomplished at least 50% of what she had meant a teacher to be like. I was lucky to be constantly associating myself with her through various organisations.
A grieving fan, (Name and address supplied)
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