BY S VENKAT NARAYAN Our Special Correspondent
NEW DELHI, September 21: Protesters demanding the scrapping of the Koodankulam nuclear power project called off their 11-day hunger strike on Wednesday after Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayaram Jayalalithaa agreed to get her cabinet to pass a resolution requesting the Government of India to halt the project.
"The Chief Minister has requested us to call off the fast and we are doing it now," SP Udhaya Kumar, Convener of People’s Movement against Atomic Power, spearheading the agitation, told reporters after his delegation met Ms Jayalalithaa in Chennai.
Jayalalithaa and her cabinet colleagues held discussions with representatives from Kanyakumari, Tirunelveli and Tuticorin in connection with the project at the state secretariat on Wednesday.
The breakthrough came after Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) V Narayanasamy called on Ms Jayalalithaa to brief her on his visit to the protest site on Tuesday. The minister was rushed to the site by Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh as his emissary after the chief minister wrote to him, demanding that work on the project be suspended till the local residents’ fears are allayed over their safety.
Narayanasamy said Ms Jayalalithaa conveyed "certain message to the Prime Minister which I will convey to him." He also said he has conveyed to her a message from Dr Singh. The prime minister, now in New York to attend the ongoing UN General Assembly session, will take a final decision on his return home next week.
Udhaya Kumar said the chief minister assured his delegation that a cabinet meeting will be convened on Thursday to request the Centre to halt the project. The state government will seek an appointment with the Prime Minister for a meeting on the issue.
He said though the protestors promised to withdraw their indefinite fast, they will "continue to keep up the pressure on the government" to scrap the project, set to be commissioned in December, a decade after work on the Russian-aided 2,000 megawatt project began.
"The committee will continue with the struggle in consultation with the AIADMK Government and the blessings of Amma (Jayalalithaa)," Kumar said.
"We do not have any problem with the state government. But, we will continue to keep our pressure against the Centre," he said.
http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=35170
When you are saying that you can take the data that has been researched in Britain and Germany as the basis, then do you also affirm that our Govt will place the same safegaurds and compensation policies as there in Britain and Germany. For the Bhopal disaster, our Govt has been shielding Unicon Carbide company (now DOW chemicals) for the last couple of years without compensating our people instead of prosecuting the DOW company. Thats the reason why people doesnt trust our Govt.
ReplyDelete