A Nightmare Called Jaduguda

It is one of India’s best kept secrets. This is the story of genocide.

The Dark Underbelly of Uranium Mining in India

Jauguda - the living dead

After over 50 years of Independence, there is another India which nobody talks about.

Why?

Because nobody knows or want to know about Jaduguda.

I spoke to hundreds of people in Mumbai and elsewhere on streets, in restaurants, bus stations, railway platforms, airports but not one person has ever heard of a place called Jaduguda in India or about its sad legacy. Sure, they all wanted round the clock electricity and were nonchalant about nuclear power. If only they knew.......  

What is happening in the name of National Pride and Self-Sufficiency is a NATIONAL SHAME. A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY.

Next time you charge your mobile phone, switch on the AC or your TV, think about the enormous and horrifying cost being extracted from locals and the tribals. 

Jaduguda in Jharkhand is one such cursed place. Cursed, because it has India’s largest uranium mines. A curse called uranium has poisoned generations and will continue to haunt all future generations too.

This is a story which a few people have tried to tell. Many times over.

Yet, no solution is in sight to this living horror.

But then, probably nobody has found an answer because nobody WANTS to find an answer?

SUMMARY:

The power that is fed into homes using nuclear energy has some of its genesis in Jharkhand, from where the raw material – Uranium – to needed power these reactors is extracted or mined.

India has sufficient uranium deposits to build a few hundred nuclear bombs but it does not have the required amount of uranium to fuel its Atomic Power Plants. The largest deposits were found in the 1960s at Jaduguda and the nuclear lobby in India rushed in to exploit the ore there. Since 1967, the Jaduguda region of Bihar has been exploited for its uranium and so have its people.

The Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) formed the Uranium Corporation of India Ltd. (UCIL) with a mandate to explore and mine this precious ore. UCIL started the exploitation of man and nature the very next year in 1968.

Over forty four years later, it has created a tragic legacy which includes loss of health, disease, deaths, ruining of social fabric and professions, environmental destruction and irreparable damage to the ecology.

The only ones who have profited from this deprivation are those associated with the Nuclear Club – those who need uranium for dubious power and atomic weapons.

 THE FACTS:

The Jaduguda mines (and to an extent, the uranium mines in Meghalaya and Andhra Pradesh) supply the bulk of the uranium needed as fuel to the ever increasing reactors in India. Currently, India has one Nuclear Fuel Complex (NFC) at Hyderabad in Southern India which is over a thousand kilometers from Jaduguda and even further from the North Eastern mines in Meghalaya.

The original mines at Jaduguda have since been expanded and now include the Narwapahar mines a few kilometres away. Together, they make it possible to extract thousands of tonnes of earth each day using a mix of techniques.

IN THE BEGINNING:

As it usually happens, the land where the uranium was discovered belonged to the tribals (adivasis), who had lived there for hundreds of years and co-existed sustainably with nature. Elders recall that the tribals were strong and rarely (if ever) fell ill. The ecology was self-sufficient with man and nature providing and caring for each other.

Enter UCIL

As usual with any nuclear project, there was complete secrecy. This was easy in India of the 1960s and remains so even today. Anything nuclear is considered top secret and classified information and the DAE has to be brought kicking and screaming into courts before they divulge any information – at times even misinformation.

UCIL’s job was of course made easier because of the remoteness of the mines and the lack of education among the tribals. Moreover, the tribals were a trusting lot – as they would later discover to their peril.

Ergo, when UCIL commenced operations there, they acquired tribal land and made no mention about the kind of material that would be mined. Nor did they inform the locals about the hazardous nature of radiation.

As long as uranium remains in nature, buried deep within the earth, it is not dangerous. But the mining process brings it out in concentrated quantities, which is further ground into dust, and it is this phase where radiation starts taking its toll by entering the body and the ecology.

To understand this better look at the uranium cycle below –

At Jaduguda, the ore is mined, milled, refined into Yellow Cake and dispatched to the Nuclear Fuel Complex (NFC), Hyderabad by road and then by trains.

As can be seen, uranium ore goes through a number of processing phases and at each stage it pollutes the environment in more ways than one.

It is important to note that unlike this diagram above, it is alleged that the depleted (or spent) uranium waste is brought back to Jaduguda for “disposal,” i.e. thrown away as debris!

When UCIL started operations, locals were promised firm jobs, medical facilities, schools, roads, better opportunities and some say even bribe money. There are stories of locals being taken to far off nuclear facilities so as to impress them about the high technology, cleanliness and safety of the project.

 

The tribals trusted the government and were trapped.

For UCIL, there was a need for people to go down into the bowels of the earth and come up with the uranium ore for which it deployed the tribals. They needed labour because even the best of mining technology still needs physical labour. The open pit mining requires people to physically go deep down into the mines to dig further and load the ore for transportation to the surface. From there on, the other processes are also labour intensive.

What this means is that ALL these people working in the mines were subjected to radiation for prolonged periods of time. They inhaled the uranium, worked with no protective clothing and ate contaminated food. When they finished work, they returned home and their contaminated uniforms were handled and washed by the other people at homes who started getting affected by the secondary contamination.

This, however, was only one form of the uranium poisoning.

The process used for uranium extraction involves conversion into a slurry from which the precious metal is extracted. The rest of the sludge is sent into to the “tailing ponds” which are supposed to hold the highly radioactive slurry.

In reality what happens is that the tailing ponds are unable to hold all the slurry and frequently overflow, especially during the monsoons. More radioactive uranium seeps into the ground and contaminates the groundwater and rivers.

The locals are forced to use the downstream river waters for everything ranging from washing, bathing, sowing and irrigation.

It is from here that the whole uranium contamination/ poisoning cycle takes a massive leap into the food chain spreading far and wide via crops, fruits, and animals. The grass growing here is highly radioactive and when animals graze, it enters their bodies and contaminates the milk and meat.

In short, uranium enters every part of the ecosystem and continues to spread further and further via the rivers, fish, the vegetables and fruits grown there and thus, what starts as a local mine affects a vast region within no time at all.

It was the legal, moral and ethical duty of UCIL to warn the locals about what was about to hit them. But that would obviously have not suited the government.

Ideally, the whole land which was acquired for mining, blasting, processing should have been out of bounds for people and the tailing ponds made in such a manner that there is no seepage into the ground. Warning boards put up to indicate high radiation and danger zones, limit the access to site only message workers and decontaminate all material worn and handled by the workers at the site itself. The processed ore should have been safely transported in well covered vehicles to the nearest railway yard for its thousand kilometer journey to NFC Hyderabad.

All this is not a utopian dream. It is common sense.

But then, I forgot that we are talking about the DAE and UCIL. Agencies for which only the ends matter – not the means to achieve these nefarious ends.

Here are the stark realities at Jaduguda and Narwapahar -

The river, which runs past Jaduguda, is met by the murky outflow from the mine workings. Here, people wash vegetables, sow and bathe in this extremely poisonous water.

Nowhere in the region does one see warning boards. It is an open invitation to use the resources here and get poisoned.

Trucks which carry the processed material from the mines are open dumpers with just a piece of plastic thrown over the top – most often, even this is missing. The dumpers spill the material on the roads all the way from the mines to the rail yards. Radiation level meters (Geiger counters) frequently go berserk as the radiation count exceeds the maximum limit which can be displayed on these meters.

Scientists designing these counters probably never imagined that any civilian region would possibly have this amount of radiation.

School buildings have been made of stone which was extracted during blasting of the mines. Placing the radiation meters on their walls makes the counters beep furiously.

Probably military grade instrumentation with higher limits needs to be used in these “civilian” areas.

Transport

The transport from the mines to Hyderabad is another horror story. Look at the picture of this open topped dumper truck below. Often, not even a plastic sheet is thrown over it. The trucks spill the ore along the way on the road sides. The hazardous material is loaded casually on goods trains which carry this material along with rakes filled with edible items. The open trucks pass through various villages and small towns and evertime they hit a speed breaker (very common in rural India because of the prestige associated with having a speed breaker outside your home to make yourself safe from vehicles); these trucks spill the hazardous material / ore at the doorstep of residents resulting in high levels of cancer even in villages further away from the actual mines.

(Below) Ore Handling in India and in Developed countries 

A technical committee advising the government, comprising representatives of pollution control board industries and a retired atomic energy expert have noted that radioactive radiations were less than the permissible limits in Jaduguda.

The Director of UCIL’s technical department Diwakar Acharya said this in defense – “They are all retired employees. Mining methods have changed a lot in the past two decades. Earlier, the workers’ health was in grave danger due to the lack of protective clothing and modern machinery. The technology we have today keeps them, as well as the local population, completely out of harm’s way,” he says.

The sad truth is that NOTHING has changed over the years here.

What has changed is the increased greed of UCIL, NPCIL, DAE and Government of India for more and more yellow cake……. 

(First published on Aug 2, 2012)

THE IMMINENT DEATH OF CIVIL NUCLEAR ENERGY

Some people believe that civilian nuclear energy programs are going great guns and will grow more in future. 

Nothing can be further from the truth. They will not.

In fact, its slow death is already on and can only accelerate in future. 

Let us understand why.

  

The nuclear energy industry has had a charmed existence for over half a century. The western world is attempting to disown their nuclear weapons and reactors but it is finding this horribly expensive and complicated to do. Yet, India wants to fall into the trap that the nuclear transnationals such as GE, Westinghouse, Toshiba, Hitachi, Areva etc have layed out. This is a near as well as a  long term disaster because this technology is not only inherently dangerous but is an upcoming disaster for India.

THE BACKGROUND:

What essentially started as military research for the development of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) was subsequently and subtly packaged as a benign and clean source of energy. But at heart, the roots of nuclear energy are firmly linked to its military and destructive use.

The cold war was an occasion that offered the nuclear industry access to massive funds, research facilities, government grants (subsidies) and huge freedom to conduct more and more research into making more and more deadly weapons.

Civilian Nuclear Energy was simply a byproduct of this Military work.

Companies and governments worked overtime to create a veil of secrecy around atomic energy so that the common person would not be able to link the two. To their credit, they succeeded for a large part. In the days before the advent of the internet, information was scarce and was expensive to procure. People, by and large, tended to believe whatever the nuclear 'scientists' and their governments told them.

Essentially, they were sold two stories via massive propaganda -

1) Nuclear industry equals 'national security' and 'national pride.' So, any opposition to nuclear energy automatically makes you an anti-national.

2) Nuclear Energy has no alternative because of its "cleanliness" and ability to deliver large amounts of power at the cheapest cost.

It is said that if a lie is told a thousand times, people start to believe that it is the truth.

Yet, it is also a truth that 'You can fool some people all the time, you can fool all the people sometimes but you cannot fool all the people all the time.'

The tipping point for the nuclear industry came after the end of the cold war. Contrary to what most people believe, Chernobyl had no major effect on the growth of the nuclear energy business. After a tiny blip, the industry was back to its own self.

Concealment, fabrications, misrepresentation of facts, propaganda, censorship of news, strong arm tactics were all part of the overall cold war game.

The world knew that a huge nuclear accident had happened in Russia.

But beyond that, they had little more knowledge. The Russians painted a picture of "all-is-well." On the other hand, the West tried to malign Russian nuclear technology and its safety. Neither really questioned nuclear energy as a whole.

Sure, there were enough independent researchers who risked their lives and limbs to bring out the truth. But it was easy for the governments in those days to tackle these civilian groups. After all, government agencies were trained to play the big spy games - for these masters this bunch of civilians was a piece of cake.

The disguise continued unabated until the unexpected end of the cold war. The end of the cold war meant that there was little need for military deterrence (?) Clearly, future wars would be fought on economic fronts and smart wars would take center stage.

Tactical weapons, quick surgical strikes on specific small strategic targets which do not require the kind of arsenal needed during the cold war days became the name of the big game. It is no longer fashionable to parade the missiles and war heads on National days and gloat about technological prowess.

These new weapons do not require plutonium but need a material that is far easier to procure - depleted uranium (DU).

DU is easily and openly available from nuclear reactors without the need for complex and

expensive re processing technologies. The guided missiles tipped with DU are hundreds of times more powerful compared to ordinary bombs and can cause massive damage to over and underground structures. Because of the fact that they do not leave a huge visible impact (like that of an Atomic Bomb at Hiroshima or Nagasaki) people do not realize that effectively a nuclear weapon has been used.

A DU slug or shell used widely

These shells and missiles have been extensively used in the wars in Iraq Serbia Afghanistan and elsewhere by the NATO forces. Sometimes they may have ensured that the targets are taken out; but mostly not. They are as deadly as a nuclear attack and leave behind vast amounts of radiation in the environment. People affected by DU develop the same conditions as those in Hiroshima or Nagasaki - the only difference being that of immediate visibility and localization. (More)

The US and NATO troops have got away by using these weapons of tactical attack for many years now and the effects are showing up in the local population there - increased cancer, deformities, mutations and all the other radiation induced diseases are seen here. The soil and ground water is polluted with uranium and will continue to do so for many decades to come. The radiation has spread wider and entered the food chain and will continue to irradiate for a long time to come.

The West had found the ideal nuclear weapon which can be used easily - without any concern of accountability or justification needed for a full blown nuclear attack.

The need to use nuclear energy and the spent fuel for Plutonium has diminished and the military had a far lesser interest in these reactors now.

Almost at the same time, another and more significant revolution was taking place.

The information revolution.

Almost out of nowhere, the computers, satellite television, instant messengers and the internet were all over the world.

Nothing was hidden. Information previously restricted to libraries or locked away in forgotten cupboards was suddenly openly available.

Information flow meant that there were no longer any holy cows. Discussions happened over emails and internet, ideas exchanged and previous paradigms challenged.

When Data gets analyzed, it turns into Information.

Massive amount of data which was scattered all over the globe earlier was put together and analyzed. Cheaper yet more powerful computers allowed this massive data to be analyzed on desktop computers without the need for super computers.

And what emerged was the naked truth.

Atomic and nuclear science is no more (or less) mysterious or complex than any other science. The sheer eliteness of being part of a select "nuclear club" was shown to be hollow. The cost of nuclear energy in purely financial terms was proven to be the highest, the enormous social damage, the horrible medical conditions and the silent environmental destruction were proven - with irrefutable data.

Troubles as they say come in multiples.

But more was to follow.

With no place to hide, the nuclear industry was hit by developments in renewable energies which took off at a massive scale which resulted in prices crashing beyond imagination. A new, safe and cost effective option had arisen for which the nuclear industry was totally unprepared – it was literally caught with its pants down!

With no business model to survive, shrinking patronage from the Defence and Government ministries; Fukushima was the final nail in the coffin for the nuclear industry. In plain, open view, the incident shamed the industry badly and showed the world that the civilian nuclear operators were leagues ahead of Big Oil and Tobacco when it came to blatant lies and endangering lives for maximizing their own profits. Safety and ethics be damned.

Decommissioning costs and Mixed Oxide Fuel myth:

As the US reactors started to age and reached about 60 years of their commissioning  a deadly truth hurt the companies operating them. They have to decommission these reactors and dispose the nuclear waste (euphemistically called as spent fuel). There was talk of using mixed uranium + plutonium oxide (MOX) fuels for future generation reactors, but that has gone horribly wrong in all countries beyond any realistic or economic horizons and are being abandoned despite the huge government subsidies which they received for decades (read reports here here and here).

Yet, India continues to harbor hopes on this failed and expensive plan which at best can be termed as a laboratory experiment - hence called as the Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor (PFBR) that has already cost the country crores of Rupees and is way beyond its projected commissioning year of 2009. 

Also, the cost of decommissioning a nuclear plant is tentatively upward of Rs. 200 crores - reference being  the recently troubled San Onofre Nuclear Generating station in California USA which was shut since the past 18 months following radioactive leakages after being "revamped" and "redesigned" . Plus, it can take anywhere from 20 to 50 years for this and to bring the land back to its original state and safe for residence (if ever). Read more.

Now, can anyone - even in their wildest dreams - explain the logic behind this disastrous folly except for the nuclear hawks and greedy politicians and businessmen? Can any Indian agree - with his hand on his heart - that after spending thousands of crores in building these reactors, India has the will, ability or the spending power to see through the costs of decommissioning  storage and security?

The folly of going nuclear as part of its energy basket is so laughable that it will get thrown out simply for economic reason if not for it's dangerous repercussions.

In the end, the nuclear industry has to blame itself for its death. Nobody - except probably its own nuclear village fraternity - will shed any tears on its death.

This is one death which does not really merit a RIP; it is a well-deserved slow death.

Economic Times looks at Himalayan Profits not at a Himalayan Disaster

T

he Economic Times this week carried an extremely biased article regarding the Uttarakhand flood tragedy titled “Uttarakhand floods: Why damning the dams is Himalayan blunder” by Avdhash Kaushal  (click here to view the said article.)

While the appearance of such a biased article is only to be expected from a “pink paper” that does not leave any stone un-turned to promote big businesses and the so called “development” based policies which the government adopts; it is a completely biased article, with deliberate falsification of ground level realities and even the language used which are not befitting one of the largest circulated business and economy publications in India. What is even more jarring is that its own sister publication from the Bennet Coleman Co.; the Times of India has carried many articles (including one in its July 3 edition) which talks of the possibility of a repeat of the Uttarakhand tragedy in the neighboring hilly state of Himachal Pradesh (H.P.) for the same reasons as Uttarakhand.

The authors' agenda appears to be as defensive as possible towards all things that can damage the ecology & environment and he goes on to blame NGO’s, environmentalists and others working to save the fragile planet by calling them “jholawala’s.” This derisive attitude of the author and the publication shows that it is indeed these “jholawala’s” who are preventing these businessmen, their business houses and their advertising partner’s from doing damage, thereby giving them such severe heartburn.

The article finds faults with every known source of energy - from coal to nuclear and even renewable solutions such as wind and solar!!!

At one point of time, his heart bleeds for the birds too when he writes that “Wind mills and the noise associated with them are harmful for ornithology….” Well, the effects of the mindless plunder of the rivers and damning of them leads to destruction of marine life as well to the protected species living in areas where the dams and the changed course of rivers affect their natural habitats. Again, he is completely mindless about the amount of noise, air and dust pollution caused by the construction of these projects.

 His next dig is at solar when he claims that “solar panels need an army of cleaners who would have to "toil in hot sun to constantly keep them (the solar panels) clean” I do not know about the author or about the editors who proof read such articles, but anyone venturing out into India will see the millions of people toiling away in the hot sun simply to make enough to survive. When they cannot even get that after toiling and sweating, many resort to committing suicide even while the champions of industry such as Montek Singh Ahuluwallia keep reducing the amount of money to remain under the Below Poverty Line figure (inflation is incidentally in double digits). Surely cleaning solar panels is far less strenuous than ploughing, sowing and reaping crops or pulling a cycle rickshaw in the blazing sun because their fertile lands were "acquired" for some dubious project giving them a pittance in return.

The agenda of these businesses and the government is simple – change the statistics to show that poverty is eliminated even while they earn super-normal profits from plundering the poor and the natural resources of the country.

Coming to his point that Hydel power is the only viable source of “development” in the state along with tourism: The people who will benefit most by these proposed large number of Hydel projects are the project developers and the contractors for whom it is a huge profitable opportunity. It is the local people who will face all the hydrological risks due to these dams, live in fear of seismic activities such as earthquakes, land slides, rockfalls and floods in this fragile and highly earthquake-prone zone. In addition, the construction of dams renders many people homeless and landless leading to continued economic difficulties, which has been seen even in the Narmada project. 

Construction of dams leads to increased heavy vehicles and machinery constantly traveling in the region, all adding to air pollution and noise pollution. The constant use by these heavy vehicles leads to road life being cut short and massive expenses in again connecting the road networks.

The fact remains that these dams would not have caused such extensive damage if there had been only a handful of them. But the sheer number of dam projects in the state - and the hundreds more that have been cleared by the state - show the immense greed of the politicians and the business houses. The constant dumping of muck and debris into the rivers is a huge problem leading to increase sedimentation rates and the accumulation of silt. In fact dams are expected to be sedimented within 25-30 years against their expected lifetime of about 50+ years. 

It might be wise for the author to study the Banqiao and Shimantan Dam breaches in China in 1975 where 100,000 or more lost their lives. Extreme rainfall beyond the planned design capability of the dam caused this worst dam failure till date. In fact, even India saw such a breach in 1979 at the Bachucha dam in Gujarat in which up to an estimated 15000 people perished. This was also because of excessive rains beyond the designed carrying capacity of the water spillways, So, when he gives specious arguments stating that the Tehri saved people, perhaps he should be thankful that the Tehri dam did not breach because the rains subsided just in time.

It is this attitude by well educated people who simply believe in one side of the issue and pander to the profit hungry and heartless business houses which is a condemnable attitude, bordering almost on criminal conspiracy.

       

The article further goes on to make ridiculous statements such as “Therefore, the jholawallahs should be banned from using known sources of production of primary electricity. They should not use secondary batteries also since they contain lead, lithium, metal hydrides and heavy metals that are likely to cause poisoning and cancer.”

This is such a hilarious and ill-informed comment that it probably was written out of frustration and not having any other facts to berate about and obviously pro-business houses once again. Solar technology has moved by leaps and bounds and has matured exponentially in the past few years. The first generation batteries and panels and cells have given way to newer technologies which are far more efficient and use very less polluting raw materials or cause huge amounts of waste. If we just talk about solar energy, then the latest available country wise installed solar capacity will surely make anyone do a rethink.

RANK	COUNTRY	Installed Solar Power per Million People
1	Germany	302  MW
2	Italy	214  MW
3	Czech Rep.	186  MW
4	Belgium	184  MW
5	Spain	95  MW
10	France	40  MW
12	Japan	38  MW
14	Switzerland	27  MW
19	Canada	16  MW
21	UK	14  MW
22	USA	13  MW
25	Taiwan	4  MW
26	Ukraine	4  MW
28	China	2  MW
32	India	0.381  MW
33	Mexico	0.356  MW
34	Brazil	0.166  MW

(Figures as available till end 2011, 2012 figures not officially available yet)

It is interesting to note here that the top countries in solar energy belong to regions which see snowfall and the sun does not shine as brightly as in India. In fact, a lot of these countries also have Hydel power potential; but the damage to the environment and ecosystem, the socio-economic impact on local population, the effects on the flora and fauna have made them opt for solar which is far safer and cheaper. 

In any case, for an ecologically fragile state to depend on Hydel power for about 78% of its needs (and increasing) does not bode well for its well-being or even for its own tourism industry.  In fact most of the North Eastern states and Himachal are also falling for this lure of money with Mehayala at 84% hydel dependence and Himachal at close to 79% 

It is nothing but shooting oneself in the foot if we look at the long term implications of such specious "development."

The second interesting takeaway from the above chart is not only the huge potential for solar in the bottom 3 countries and which has not happened (They are all blessed with strong sunshine and wind). This is not for any of the reasons which the suddenly bleeding heart environment and health conscious author gives us, but because of vested interests of large business houses to set up dubious coal, gas and nuclear power projects where there is extremely high earnings during construction, operations and finally even in the decommissioning and waste disposal. They would very well like to keep their businesses well-oiled in all aspects and laugh all the way to the bank.

Arguably, there is no energy source which is 100% clean. But common logic tells you that every country, every region and every state should adopt a sustainable way of living, using as little of the scarce natural resources and to make efforts not to add more to the rampant pollution and climate changes which cause such disasters. 

It also does not befit a publication of such stature as the Economic Times to indulge in such propaganda – probably for their own vested business interests.

The good of the people, the country - in fact of the whole earth - should receive priority rather than resorting to such anti people and anti-national false advertising for whom humanity is subservient to their business interests.

NaMo Fear crosses Gujarat, Andhra and extends to the US

NaMo fear crosses Gujarat, Andhra and extends to US

Narendra Modi alias NaMo who could well be the next PM of India

Yesterday, I had published a fake Facebook wall detailing tongue in cheek about the collusion between Indian politicians and the global corporate world (link here.)

And we are already seeing the frenzy by NPCIL and the Centre to quickly adhere to the diktats of the US masters as in Kovvada Andhra Pradesh even as the US giant GE does not have certification from the US Regulators for its planned nuclear reactors !!

Is it not shameful that the American Secretary of State came to India, gave an ultimatum to the Government of India that the Gujarat nuclear deal had better be signed by September 2013? Or else.....

Obviously, as I pointed out in the fake FB wall, the upcoming elections are giving the Americans much trouble. They know the Congress will most likely lose the general elections in 2014. This means a potential wilderness for the nuclear companies like GE and Westinghouse-Toshiba for about five years.

This is not to imply that the BJP will not sign the nuclear agreements and contracts. Far from it, the BJP is almost of the same opinion as the Congress as far as nuclear energy is concerned because of the common glue – kickbacks, contracts and money.

The BJP would gleefully sign any deal or even dilute the Nuclear Liability Act and make it easier for the Americans to set up their reactors in Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh.

But then, there is a major diplomatic issue here.

The next ‘projected’ Prime Minister of India could well be a certain Mr. Narendra Modi (NaMo in short) of the BJP.

The same NaMo who has steadfastly been refused entry visa to the US because of his alleged collusion in the Gujarat communal riots of 2003 where he was alleged to have masterminded the pogrom to eliminate the minority Muslim population in connivance with senior police, bureaucracy and intelligence officials. 

The cases are meandering through courts, special courts, special investigations and have not reached anywhere near to closure. So, as per Indian Laws, NaMo is presumed innocent until proven guilty (in court). However, many people in India and the US government have already decided that based on circumstantial evidence NaMo is indeed guilty for the massacre of hundreds (nobody knows the real toll) of innocent people including women and children and causing a reign of terror over the whole state of Gujarat.

Now, if this gentleman becomes the Prime Minister, Obama might have to meet him, shake hands with him in some international conference or even invite each other to their countries as per protocol.

This is the worst case scenario which the US government would want to get into. They cannot be seen overly capitalist and shake hand with their erstwhile enemy No. 1 whom they have denied entry for so many years.

NaMo will obviously milk the situation to the maximum and probably even invite the American President to India (probably even to Gujarat) and rub salt into the wounds. He will stall any attempts by the Americans to do big business in India without extracting his pound of flesh.

Now, what he will try to extract will be a matter of conjecture, but it could be even a small concession like a Visa to travel to the US. As a charmer, NaMo is undoubtedly a great personality. And the US has a huge number of very wealthy Indian Guajarati’s who can contribute substantially to the BJP coffers!!!

It all depends on which way things pan out in the next three odd months before the whole of India slips into election mode slated for early 2014. John Kerry was spot on in fixing September 2013 as the deadline for signing a contract between NPCIL and Westinghouse. But, the Indian government has gone a step forward with its servile attitude and also offered to clear the way for the GE supplied Kovvada reactors in Andhra Pradesh which even  the US government has not certified. This premature land acquisition and bending backwards to please the Americans will eventually backfire on the Congress party - although they may just want to get out the mess they themselves created while signing the Indo-US Civil Nuclear Deal in 2008.

All one can wish is that the next government has enough sense to realize that there is a limit to how much money can be made out of disastrous projects like Jaitapur etc which will completely destroy lives, livelihoods, environment besides being economically unviable.

But then these wishes will not come true because the Congress and the BJP are two sides of the same Nuclear coin.

Secret FB Wall of Salman Khurshid and John Kerry - REVEALED

Mithivirdi: Massive Protest Against Proposed US-imported Reactors on April 26

Angry at the flawed and incorrect EIA report submitted by NPCIL in March and adamant that they will not allow this dangerous technology in their backyards, residents from Mithi Virdee,

Protesting farmers during the public hearing held earlier this year

adjoining villages and from Bhavnagar city will hold a protest meet and a rally. The rally to be held at the Bhavnagar Town Hall will be held on April 26th and will coincide with the 26th Anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster of 1986. Thousands are still affected by the Chernobyl events and a large portion of the region is still uninhabitable.

Concerned people from the region do not want such a repetition of the events in their region

and have called for a cancellation of the project. The project has envisaged the installation of 6000MW electricity generation by installing American made Wistinghouse-Toshiba AP 1000 reactors. The technology used in these reactors is suspect and many leading international nuclear experts have called it a “unsafe” and potentially dangerous technology.

The rally comes in the backdrop of various other factors such as the proximity of the site to the worls largest ship breaking complex at Alang. In fact Alang has had a long and chequered history of dangerous accidents involving hazardous chemicals. The coastal regions around the Alang costline extending for about 16kms is already highy pollued with toxic waste. On the other side of Mithi Virdee is another problem – coal mining and a thermal plant which results in hige pollution as well.

Hemmed in on both sides by these factors, the residents of the region are in no mood to surrender their land for this monstrous project which has the potential for wide spread destruction of land and the sea. The residents have pledged that they will not accept assurances from the NPCIL nor will they accept ANY amount of compensation for surrendering their lands. The land around the projected site is highly fertile (despite claims of NPCIL that the land is barren) and has huge orchids of mango, chickoo, coconuts among others. These provide with a substantial income to the local populace and they do not seem intent to listen to the claims being made about the site evaluation which they claim was never done.

Fishing is another activity which will be adversely affected (or maybe completely terminated) if the nuclear power project is set up. The catch for the fish from the Mithi-Virdee region are in great demand in regions as far as 100 km from the region and also provide a good source of income.

Another factor which has been largely ignored is the threat by foreign ships in the region due to the proximity to Alang. About 30-40 foreign flag ships sail into Alang ship breaking yard each month and there is a possibility of terrorists mounting an attack on a nuclear facility using the cover of one of these ships. Closeness to Pakistan is also another danger which cannot be discounted.

The Shatranju dam supplies drinking water to the huge bustling city of Bhavnagar is barely 5 km away from the proposed nuclear site. Any damage to the nuclear plant will cut off water supply to the city which will cause a huge human rights problem in the whole region.

All these factors have made the site selection itself highly questionable according to the local residents prompting the massive rally on April 26th at Bhavnagar. It remains to be seen if the officials will listen and address the concerns of the local residents or ignore them as they have done at the various sites where new nuclear projects are being planned.