“I would rather have questions that can’t be answered than answers that can’t be questioned”
~ Richard Feynman, American Theoretical Physicist & Nobel Laureate
People around Arshinakeri (Koppal Dt, Karnataka) are concerned about government’s proposal to construct a nuclear power plant (NPP) in their vicinity. [Ref.1] Government has recently started preliminary land survey of the area, to identify 1,200-acres for a NPP. People of the area, peacefully protesting at this survey stage, say that they are already burdened with pollution from industries, and fear for their health and safety due to nuclear contamination from a NPP proposed there. They also have fears of loss of habitats and livelihoods, besides environmental pollution concerns. (The negative influence of environmental pollution or degradation with people’s health, safety and livelihoods, is not generally understood). Reportedly, 2,500 families have refused to give up their land. Authorities assure them compensation for acquired land.
Central government has written to several district administrations across the country, including three in Karnataka, to identify land which is not prone to natural disasters like earthquake, landslides, flooding and volcanic eruption, for construction of NPPs. Koppal is one district in Karnataka, where people have protested.
The Koppal District people’s peaceful protest against NPPs, is only the most recent. There have been many earlier people’s peaceful protests against establishment or expansion of NPPs in several states, notably Kaiga (Karnataka), Kudankulam (Tamil Nadu), Jaitapur (Maharashtra), Gorakhpur (Haryana), and Kovvada (Andhra Pradesh). There have also been people’s peaceful protests after NPPs have started operations, and against proposed or operating nuclear fuel cycle ancillary units like uranium mines (Jaduguda, etc), nuclear fuel reprocessing plants (Trombay, Tarapur, Kalpakkam), uranium enrichment plants (Ratnahalli), rare material plants (Ernakulam Dt).
The reasons for every one of these people’s protests are:
# Expected or experienced health and safety problems, and/or
# Land, habitat and livelihood loss, and/or
# Absence of fair compensation, rehabilitation and resettlement for land, habitat and livelihood loss, and/or
# Government proceeding with survey or construction without public consultation, and/or
# Governments’ intransparency and intransigence in implementing extant laws, and/or
# Government violating or side-stepping environmental laws and regulations, and/or
# Governments’ unfulfilled, insincere promises.
The above seven reasons for people’s protests do not exclusively concern NPPs. They also concern every large project (dams, canals, mines, expressways, airports, factories) anywhere in our country, which impinges on people who mostly belong to the lowest socio-economic levels. For the most recent example concerning dams, consider the protests against Arunachal Pradesh’s Upper Siang dam project [Ref.2].
Political parties or powerful persons seeking political power, have selectively supported people’s protests against NPPs and abandoned the protests, possibly because it was politically inexpedient to continue. Just three instances concerning NPPs, will suffice:
# The people’s protest against the proposed NPP at Kovvada (Srikakulam Dt, Andhra Pradesh) was supported by CPI and CPI(M) party workers [Ref.3]. Today these political parties are silent. Interestingly, CPI or CPI(M) did not support people’s protests against the NPP at Kudankulam (Tirunelveli Dt, Tamil Nadu), reportedly because the Kudankulam NPP was of Russian origin!
# Tamil Nadu CM Jayalalithaa (AIADMK) supported the people’s protest against expansion of the Kudankulam (Tirunelveli Dt, Tamil Nadu) NPP, even though (Congress) PM Manmohan Singh had requested her to support the project. Interestingly, later CM Jayalalithaa made a U-turn [Ref.4] and looked away when State Police booked sedition cases, and cases of “enemies of the State” against protestors.
# The people’s Paramanu Virodhi Morcha protest against the Gorakhpur (Fatehabad Dt, Haryana) NPP in June 2013, was supported and led by (retired Army Chief) General V.K.Singh [Ref.5]. Interestingly, when the BJP-led NDA-2 government was formed in 2014, the general abandoned the people’s protest after he joined the BJP and was given a ministerial berth.
Just asking – a few questions
Are people who protest because they are concerned and anxious about their own and their children’s health and safety, and about losing land, habitat and livelihood, and fear penury on being evicted and re-located, simple “fools”, who can be fobbed off by governments’ promises? Or are their concerns not valid?
Are people protesting across states and over decades, “uneducated” folk who are easily misled? Aren’t these the same “uneducated” folk whom politicians beg for their votes, but otherwise rarely if ever, directly interact with them?
Are people ignorant of the risks of nuclear radiation? Have people not heard of the horrendous Chernobyl or Fukushima nuclear accidents? Can DAE officials who claim that nuclear accidents may happen once in a million years, guarantee that an accident will not happen next week? Are DAE officials’ claims that our nuclear scientists and engineers implementing our nuclear safety standards, can and will prevent accidents, believable?
Are people unaware of earlier people’s protests across states and over decades against NPPs, and unaware that the reasons therefor are the same as their own? Don’t people know that the millions already forcibly displaced by large projects (not only NPPs, but also dams, canals, mines, expressways, airports, factories) are inhabiting slums in towns and cities, and therefore fear for themselves and their families?
Why do so many development policies, proposals, programs and projects, which threaten or cause large-scale displacement, loss of land, habitat and livelihood, only impact the lowest socio-economic groups? Can cash or even land really compensate them for social and economic disruption?
Are people across states and over decades, who are protesting against NPPs (and also dams, canals, mines, expressways, airports, factories), misled by an “anti-nuclear” (or “anti-development”) lobby with the ‘agenda’ of hindering India’s progress?
What could be the reason that people’s peaceful protests are rarely given even brief inner-page reportage in the ‘mainstream’ print media (the very few independent-minded newspapers are exceptions), and almost never in electronic media? Why is the so-called alternative news media – in which this article may possibly be published – which carries news of peaceful protests, not read by our literate and educated people? Why indeed would an “alternative” news media be required, if commercially owned and operated ‘mainstream’ media gave fair coverage to people’s peaceful protests?
Are people’s peaceful protests anti-democratic, and are governments which neglect people’s concerns and problems, and forcefully suppress people’s protests, conducting themselves in keeping with democratic norms of governance? Are governments which fail to engage with peaceful protestors, and prefer to suppress news of protests from national media, behaving responsibly?
Why do governments across states and across decades crackdown on peacefully protesting people with police force? Are people protesting against nuclear radiation and/or land-livelihood loss, and environmental degradation, “seditious” or “enemies of the state”? In cracking down on protestors, are governments knowingly or unknowingly acting on behalf of vested interests, to suppress people’s protests? [Similar questions may be asked about policies, plans, proposals, projects for dams. canals, mines, expressways, factories, etc., which governments fast-track to execution, with scant regard to extant laws, and with cursory – if any – consultation with affected populations].
Are politicians and political parties who support protestors and then abandon them, opportunist and unprincipled? What are their motivations? Are they and their policies biased towards corporate interests, including a possible quid pro quo? What can one make of the failure of legislators in State Assemblies and Parliament, to effectively raise people’s issues in the House, or of the ruling parties brushing aside the rare tabling of such matters?
Is it fair that social workers, lawyers, engineers, accountants, and other professionals, who support people’s peaceful protests, are branded as anti-development or anti-national, ignoring the fact that they are pro-people? Does branding such persons as “andolanjeevis” and similar pejoratives, smack of judgmentalism? Why are draconian laws like UAPA, invoked against professional journalists who merely report such events?
Should not governments – and the worthies who support and implement government policies, plans, programs and projects – be open to considering contrary and critical views, in the larger public interest? Or are they blinded by greed for power and/or pelf?
Are governments acting on the basis of the faulty logic of “I have already made up my mind; don’t confuse (bother) me with facts”, as pithily stated by American Stock Investor & Author Philip Arthur Fisher?
The foregoing (and other) questions are asked by those who believe in the Heaven of Freedom, “Where the mind is without fear … and knowledge is free”. Should we not be asking such questions to ourselves, and also to those in positions of power?
Just asking, if you don’t mind …
References
1. Pavan Kumar H; “Locals raise concerns about proposed nuclear plant in Koppal dist”; <https://www.deccanherald.com/india/karnataka/locals-raise-concerns-about-proposed-nuclear-plant-in-koppal-dist-3335062>; Deccan Herald; December 28, 2024.
2. Aathira Perinchery; “Protests Intensify in Arunachal Pradesh Against Siang Upper Multipurpose Project”; <https://thewire.in/environment/siang-arunachal-pradesh-upper-multipurpose-project-protests>; The Wire; 18 December 2024.
3. Siva G; “Kovvada fisherfolk protest nuke power plant”; <https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/kovvada-fisherfolk-protest-nuke-power-plant/articleshow/7739825.cms>; Times of India; March 19, 2011.
4. “Jayalalithaa suppressed stir: Prasanth Bhushan”; <http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/article3271450.ece>; The Hindu; April 2, 2012.
5. “General V K Singh to lead protest at Gorakhpur nuclear power plant”; <https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/general-vk-singh-to-lead-protest-at-gorakhpur-nuclear-power-plant/articleshow/20807622.cms>; Times of India; June 28, 2013.
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Major General S.G.Vombatkere holds a Civil Engineering (Structural dynamics) PhD from I.I.T., Madras.
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