Listed

It was two days after the IB secret document was leaked that a friend alerted me that I was Listed. This was unexpected, but not unduly surprising in view of my open position against India's entire nuclear program, particularly that at Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant (KKNPP). I believed then, as I do now, that survival of any democracy depends on availability of public space for divergent and dissenting viewpoints and scope to express these openly, to persuade public opinion and thus to collectively influence decisions serving our combined destiny.

Far worse has already happened at KKNPP, way before this IB report. At the height of the anti-Kudankulam agitation, peaceful protesters were harassed, beaten, jailed for opposing an energy project that could endanger their lives  and that of their progeny; would jeopardise health, and seriously damage local livelihoods and ecology. Thousands of FIRs were lodged against protesters, young and old, women and children, on grave charges of being seditious and for waging war against the state.  Yet, protests continued and spread far beyond the KKNPP zone, to other states and metros.

Bogey and myths of foreign funded(FF) NGOs were conjured by the state way back in 2012, by our PM himself (see here)to derail  increasingly serious public discussions that protesters against the KKNPP had succeeded in bringing to media's attention and in open forums. The debate was not merely about running KKNPP from within a thriving and independent community of fisher folks and subjugating them, but increasingly on the topic of rights. For the first time the image of the protester radicalized - from voiceless, downtrodden destitute, to strident communities with women alongside men, young children and very old, who were fully informed on the project and also their rights; they had the temerity to challenge the establishment; they were loud, articulate, engaging, debating and very determined. The State, refusing to engage on either the necessity of KKNPP, or the issue of people's democratic rights, had no option but to attack the questioners with an elaborate fiction. The leaked IB report just substantiates and perpetuates an old lie - with many more lies, more names, and utterly ridiculous figures, without any supporting arithmetic, for the net national fiscal loss due to these anti-national FF NGOs.

KKNPP 1 is commissioned and is now producing at full capacity. Yet, the orgy of repression is not stemmed; there continue to be those who are inconvenient, who think and dare question, the dangerous ones - these have been identified and blacklisted because thinking, speaking, having a different viewpoint hurts our democratic nation. Others, like me have been listed, as merely supporting these anti-nationals.

One thing that leaking this secret report does: it has made state's position very clear; dissent is anti-national and unpatriotic. Right to complain, legitimately, has expired. Those wronged must accept in grace that their sacrifice is mandatory for a larger national good - forget that the rich always benefit  and never get to make sacrifices or be patriots. New lows in democratic standards have been set in this largest democracy where might is not just right, but also rich and corporatized.

But India's public, its civil society, will not stomach this. We will continue to challenge set notions, ideologies, and politics of globalized development. We recognize that to convert legitimate, peoples movements into an elaborate web of ill-conceived lies is just that - a huge charade - and we laugh. People are waking and the state is nervous!

Hunger

I have been involved with issues related to human rights, for sometime now. I am aware that the world is a hungry place.  A few years back I had been invited to Taj for  conference on abolishing world hunger. Needless to say I did not go.

Today my sister alerted me on the news of adivasi elders dying of hunger in Thane.  I also read about it here, here and here.  I also forced myself to stare at the horrific, violent google images of the 'starving' and face the world that also is - a world of primarily human making. Apparently only 8% of starvation deaths are a result of some natural calamity - we, the human race, can take a collective responsibility for causing the rest.

The point is not - did I personally create this inhuman hunger,  terrible misery? will anything happen if I eat less? I do believe that by eating less, less than I need, I will microscopically experience what it feels like - the gnawing pains of hunger pangs, and this might sensitize me to imagine, how this must be like, if this were not by choice, if eating was not just less, but just not possible at all, for days on end, till one lay ones self down and dies - quietly, without a choice.

 The point is, can I do something, even a tiny bit about it? Can I, as a grown up responsible person, make this a part of my choice? to not avert my eyes - have their starvation penetrate the consciousness of my future actions? Can I cling on to a hope that change is possible, but only with a determined will and lots of hard work? Can I? Will I?

Will You?

A Tear Drop in the Ocean

Sri Lanka sits like a giant tear drop on the expanse of Indian Ocean. Over the last three decades, the country has been terrorized, ravaged, and destroyed by a brutal and horrific civil war where neither side has spared the other. Large areas of the country have seen unimaginable horrors with rapes, tortures and exterminations. The war culminated with state sponsored and large scale ethnic cleansing of its Tamil minorities. Crimes against the minorities continue, but under the radar, unseen and mostly ignored by the world outside. To the outside world, Sri Lanka has reverted to its original identity as a lush tropical island - a drop of paradise, beckoning the lost and the seeking " Buddham Sharanam Gacchami".

I recently went to Sri Lanka. I went as a mind less tourist, shoving aside all that I knew and all that I believed in - to wander over the contours of its cool hills, to plunge into aquamarine depths of its beautiful ocean, to explore the dark emerald cacophony of its still virgin forests; I ignored the human calamity, loss and despair and roamed the country in silence, being just an observer, a traveler. And, there was plenty here to please - from fire eaters and dancers of Kandy, to ancient abandoned cities of Polanaruwa, the rock fortress of Sigiriya to a vibrant cosmopolitan Colombo. I spent most time on the unspoilt, quiet beaches of Mirissa and Hikkaduwa - swimming in silken waters, and walking barefoot, miles along the soft sandy beaches.

What struck me most was the people - and how gentle and pleasant they seemed. No one seemed to be in a mad rush; the country was very clean, with no obvious signs of garbage, dumps, or  plastics; I saw no slums, and the rivers ran clean, dense and tropical brown. There was no honking on the roads, or rarely if ever; the public transport was cheap and frequent, out numbering private cars and autos. People looked at you and smiled, not having yet learnt to avoid gaze while saying " how are you" - in passing. People paused for long chats...the whole mood was unhurried and relaxed.

While I spoke, engaged and listened, and wandered  through the country, I also pondered 'what makes hate?'. I avoided speaking in Tamil, for fear of entering its domain of suspicion, fear and hate and managed to mostly avoid the whole genocide issue. Everything changed at the mention of Tamils, the separatist movement, or the killings, including the state sponsored genocide. I brought up the subject only twice. Once with a young and devout Sinhalese and the next time with a Tamil hotel owner.

The young buddhist, while espousing vegetarianism and non-violence towards animals felt that the killing of tamils was justified for the murders that had been committed - especially of monks, women, and children by the LTTE. He was enraged at the concept of a separate Tamil nation and felt that Sri Lanka belonged to the Sinhalese - and not the hindu tamils or the muslims.

I spoke to the Tamilian at the end of a long day. He must be about forty, thin with a belly, balding, hard working and with an easy laugh. I was dining on a simple fare of masala dosa and filter coffee; the restaurant was empty except for the owner and staff - all of whom spoke to each other in Tamil. The man came and sat down with us for a chat, about his relatives in Tamil Nadu, the cost of things and all the general stuff. He was happy to speak to an Indian in Tamil. And then I asked " what about the killings in the north?" The man went completely silent and then quickly looking around to make sure there were no Sinhalese around said " They are all gone.... killed..everyone, about four lakh people died in a few days..the army went in...killed and burnt everything down. Whatever was left was dumped in the ocean...no one knows how many missing were killed ...our people know, but no one talks about it". He seemed to have great deal to say about India's role in the war including, "She (Sonia Gandhi) did not help..why should she help anyone who killed her husband..?"
The conversation ended abruptly with a late comer walking in for a delayed dinner. The Tamil did not approach our table again.

I left Sri Lanka, as I had entered it, with a heavy heart, and a burden of conscience - denied. I knew of the evil that lurked even in this paradise - of evil in man's heart - which flourished and fractured even while the sun shone, the winds played with waves and forests chanted their evening songs.

Leaking Liability Strategically

The issue of India's Civil Nuclear Liability has been a contentious one, with charged reactions from all sides. The principal points of the law, as it now stands, are a maximum liability cap of Rs. 2500 crores, in event of a disaster, to the operator, which in this case would be Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd(NPCIL) and GoI, plus a clause that allows NPCIL to subsequently sue the nuclear supplier for damages. It is this tiny clause that has deterred foreign commercial interests from venturing into nuclear trade with India - especially in a post Fukushima world.

The Indian state, with its nuclear establishment, under international and US pressure, is pushing for a dilution of India's liability clause to open up India's nuclear energy sector for commercialisation;  the foreign suppliers  are also keenly eyeing investment opportunities with India's ambitious goals of expanding its civil nuclear facilities, but can only afford to risk business ventures if the nuclear opportunity is offered risk-free - i.e. without the baggage of an eventual supplier liability - even if they were responsible by providing defective technology that caused a nuclear disaster.

Such a dilution was staunchly opposed by anti-nuclear activists, especially in pockets around the upcoming nuclear facilities, since this could potentially lead to a weakening of quality controls from a non-liable supplier and thus pose an increased risk of future calamity. Also, sections of India's civil society voiced their opposition based on the horrific human tragedy and fiasco, played out in the aftermath of the Bhopal chemical disaster; they were unwilling to let the Indian tax payers take full financial responsibility for any future and potentially a more dangerous nuclear disaster caused by a liability-shielded supplier's negligence and failure. The dilution issue also faced partisan reactions with nationalistic jingoism from right to expressed opposition from the left [See a recent mix of reactions here].

It is important to note that the recent unfolding of corruption charges against Zio Podolsk for supplying substandard equipment to nuclear facilities - both Russian and foreign - is part of the same larger concern of what can and will play out without a strictest liability clause that force adherence to quality control. Agreement for Units 1 and 2 of Kudankulam, between India and Russia, predated our Civil Nuclear Liability and was therefore exempt from it. One might argue that a better system of checks and monitoring, mandated if Russia were functioning within a tight nuclear liability clause, would have probably lead to a less compromised system with fewer substandard parts than were probably supplied to Kudankulam.

Now, this was the current state of affairs - or so I thought. Behind the scenes, however, a whole different drama had already played out. I chanced upon this script from WikiLeaks.

There are many serious and grave revelations:

1) It appears that Indian officials are willing to compromise the liability issue and facilitate free nuclear commerce with the US provided they receive strategic cooperation on the issues of reprocessing and enrichment. India would then ratify the Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear damage(CSC), despite this not being a recommended choice for the nation. India's signing the Safeguard Agreement with IAEA also was conditional to progress on nuclear reprocessing and enrichment.

2)The officials reiterated their commitment to the letter of intent, already been signed with the US, for two nuclear parks with a combined capacity of 10,000 MW. The site explorations were concluded although the sites not finalised.

3)There was a strong push to encourage participation of private sector in power generation and management and also for partnerships between Indian firms and  US suppliers - to keep the cost of nuclear energy competitive.

The need for concern is strong. The civil nuclear liability issue, that provides a safety net for Indian citizens, in case of a nuclear event, is being used as a bartering chip for so called 'more important' strategic goals. That this happens behind closed doors, and with far fetched ambitions for the nuclear energy sector - without media participation and far from public eye, is a cause for further worry. That private Indian vendors and public-private-partnerships are encouraged, takes the exercise even further away from the realm of safe-and-secure, with increased difficulty for any vigilant monitoring or supervision of quality control - necessary for the complex and risky nuclear industry. And thus to systematically derail national interest and safety of its citizens by weakening the issue of liability,  under such circumstances, is just sheer madness. Beware!

EWS Evictions: The Aftermath

The demolitions at the EWS quarters in Ejipura started on 18th Jan 2013. In a matter of a few days, a thriving bustling community of about 1500 homes was razed to the ground. There have been a variety of efforts by various volunteer groups to reach out to the victims by providing water, food and assistance with finding alternate shelters and providing some financial aid to cover part of its costs. 

As of yesterday, on part of one perimeter directly outside the original demolished site there were 34 families who were braving out with their young and old under harsh sun and nowhere to go. The reasons range from not having any identification to avail of some financial assistance, to not having enough money to meet the rest of the required rent deposit before they could move into some other home. 

All this time, the state has provided several assurances of help to those evicted while remaining unbudging on the issue of actually holding off from further eviction drives - now from the streets and footpaths around the razed area.  Even as I type this note, I have heard that police are forcing remaining families out of the area. It is reported that one woman has poured kerosene over herself and tried to commit suicide. 

The photos below were taken yesterday afternoon. They tell their own stories. Can the state do this to its own people? And where can the poor go?

BBMP's Large Donation to Maverick

Over the last few days, BBMP and its bulldozers, under the protection of a large and armed police force, have razed about 2000 shelters of the Economically Weaker Section in Ejipura. These actions have been carried out using terrible brute force and in arrogant impunity on the basis of a high court order of Aug. 2012. The Ejipura story is a larger than life greek tragedy unfolding from within realms of India's push for fiscal growth, and its horrific need to hide its all pervasive poverty behind glittering malls - like the one which will arise from the rubble of destroyed homes and lost lives. The photos below are taken by MirnoPasquali

Big Questions that remain: Why a PPP between BBMP and Maverick Pvt Ltd.? Why the diversion of public property, earmarked for our Economically Weak Sections (EWS), to private companies for profiteering? Why the sacrifice of shelters of our poorest, to build Malls of the rich?

Maverick Constructions, via its PPP will get 8 acres of prime property in the heart of Kormangala - one of the poshest localities in the city. According to reports this is valued at anywhere from 200 to 300 crores.
If we take the property cost in Koramangala at Rs.10000/sq.ft (market rate) then 8 acres = 8x40000 sq.ft = 320000sq.ft will cost 320 crores - consistent with the above values.

In exchange Maverick will build 1640 homes of 312 sq.ft each. Even if we adopt a construction cost of Rs.1000/sq.ft (for an average middle class type home) - the entire cost of construction to Maverick is 312x1640x1000=51 crores. So, Maverick Constructions will profit anywhere between Rs. 150 - 250 crores - just by entering into this agreement.

The Govt. claims that it has no money to construct EWS homes, although BBMP's annual budget is more than 4000 crores. Also Bangalore Development Authority (BDA), city's other civic body,  has failed to collect similar sums in rents from its malls, even while earmarking  additional Rs.500 crores more for building new malls.

So..Whose interests does the State really serve? And, how are the EWS displaced families in Ejipura, now on streets, benefited?

Bloody Power!

I have been away. For eight weeks. Really Away - no phone, internet, connection to my regular life or loved ones - to retreat into myself and find connections within and without - in a natural, mostly non-peopled world of things wild, wide and beautiful.

I return to find many things drastically changed in a world that dominates my life i.e. my intense and sometimes obsessive preoccupation with the civil liberties and humans rights challenges and horrors of this country. Foremost among these obsessions , for the last year, has been with the intense, prolonged, passionate and peaceful opposition to the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant mounted by the local communities fighting to preserve their life, health, environment and livelihood in a post-Fukushima, and more enlightened world - at least more aware about real dangers in presuming safety of nuclear technologies.

I left during an impasse between the state and the protesters, the latter having found support from heavy weights like Aruna Roy. I returned and found time to catch up with mails only to find that a repressive state that could charge thousands as seditious had crossed the final line, of reasonable and restrained, to squash protests using brutal violence, with guns and batons. No one was spared, not children, aged, women. Two were killed - and I did not know. All this bloodshed - for electric power? for personal and political power?for national development? with Nuclear Power?

Bloody Power used to shed Blood of the Poor to serve hidden agendas with Nuclear Power - Bloodied Power!

Erratum and An Update on Populations Placed Under Nuclear Risk

Karuna Raina called today regarding my blog on numbers at risk due to current and proposed nuclear plants.
Staring at the table, it appears that Koodankulam has been counted twice, once as itself, and once more as Tirunelvelli. This is an error. The total numbers at risk within 80km radius is now 113 million instead of 122 million. However, few points are noteworthy. First, for six of the plants I have used 2001 census data. The average increase in India's population over the 2001-2011 decade is 17.64%; so the populations around each of these plants is likely to increase by about a similar percentage. Also proximity to large towns have been ignored; for example Rawatbhata is 25mi from Kota - a large city. Also in the list of India's nuclear planned and proposed plants,  I find that there are a few plants I have not included in my list. Of these, interestingly, Haripur is becoming the most haunting with an increasing likelihood of resurrection. And, the population density of Bardhaman district (2011 census) is 1100/sq.km - more than double of Tirunelvelli/Koodankulam area. Thus the basic premise of about 10% of India's population being placed at risk due to the presence of current or proposed nuclear plant - still holds - and is likely to go up - if calculated precisely.

Koodankulam Nuclear Power Plant, Democracy and Sedition

The protest over a Nuclear Power Plant at Koodankulam (KKNPP) started soon after India and Russia signed an agreement on the project, way back on November 20, 1988. In May 1989, ten thousand people gathered to oppose the project. Police disconnected mikes and opened fire.

A lull followed due to the collapse of the Soviet bloc and also the assassination of India's PM, Rajiv Gandhi. The project was revived in 1997 and linked to the purchase of T-90 tanks, SU-30 planes and the Admiral Gorshkov submarine from Russia. It took ten years to hold a public hearing on the project - seven thousand people attended. This meeting was abruptly discontinued when people protested that the proceedings were not conducted in the local language.

The protest movement around the nuclear plant, People's Movement Against Nuclear Energy (PMANE), gained enormously in strength and support, following the Japanese nuclear disaster at Fukushima, leaping into national visibility and much wider public prominence. The protesters set up an independent, technically savvy expert committee of PMANE to challenge the State and India's nuclear establishment with tough questions.  Their opposition to the project revolved around some very simple and basic positions:

Nuclear industry is associated with well documented hazards - even in normal operations -. which are harmful to the health of humans and environment. People living in the vicinity of the KKNPP had a right to protect their own lives, and the lives of their future generations, and rejected this hazardous technology from operating in their backyards - they also opted not to need its benefits.

The heat dump from the nuclear power plant would significantly increase the temperature along their shoreline - where they fished, and endanger the traditional livelihood - on which they were dependent. They intended to protect their livelihood mechanisms, which could not be guaranteed once the reactor became operational.

Safety of any nuclear plant against a serious accident cannot ever be guaranteed. While suppliers of India's planned, imported nuclear plants scuttled behind and demanded further dilution of India's liability clause, Russians were fully exempt from shouldering any liability in case of a future accident at KKNPP - even if due to their own faulty technology. People around KKNPP  realised that they were being required to risk their lives, while the providers of the technology risked nothing - not even a financial loss.

PMANE demanded scrapping the entire project, arguing on the basis of geologic unsuitability of the site, technical issues related water availability - crucial to the running of any nuclear plant,  large and adverse impact on livelihoods of local fishing communities, and the high population density around the plant - making evacuation a virtual impossibility - in case of a catastrophic accident.

PMANE opposed the Koodankulam nuclear power plant with an ever increasing strength and following of women, men, young and old, across religious, caste, class, and state boundaries. It drew observers, and enlisted solidarity and support from students, professionals, scientists, journalists, as also from people's movements and activists spanning  political ideologies, and developmental paradigms. The movement aroused curiosity, interest and sympathies from the thinking and the comfortable, educated class, and thereby initiated a process of inquiry into India's development, and questions of who sacrifices and who gains. It soon became one of the two largest people's movements in India's current history - the other being Anna's movement against corruption. However, unlike the latter, which was fragmentary in nature and confused in goals, the PMANE movement stood out for its singularly clear demand of a Nuclear Free Koodankulam, Nuclear Free India and Nuclear Free World. The movement belonged to those people who were the chosen victims for India's irrational nuclear ambitions; and they had no option, but to fight - to live.

The protesters sat in peaceful dharnas and observed long periods of fasts - en mass - drawing public and state's attention to their plight. Each day drew crowds of thousands, all fasting, to a village center.  All shops were closed - small fraction made it under the shades of plastic awnings - volunteers carried around buckets with water sachets for free distribution. Women with children sat, under scorching sun or pouring rain, sometimes with a sagging umbrella, listening to their leaders talk, and they spoke themselves - on mikes - with a rare confidence in clarity of purpose - to save themselves, their families and their communities from the immediate danger of a monstrous nuclear reactor. It was uplifting to see their faces - alive, alert, listening - after all what was being spoken about dealt with their future, their combined fates.This group of mostly women, young and old,  succeeded in blockading the entry to the KKNPP in Oct. 2011, till the Tamil Nadu state finally agreed to not allow any further work to proceed on the plant - till all their doubts and fears were allayed.

On March 20, 2012, Jayalalitha - the chief minister of the state ofTamil Nadu, in a clearly political bartering with the center, approved the KKNPP for operations. About 6000 heavily armed police force guarded the the entrance to the reactor site and immediately arrested several hundreds, including key leaders of the people's movement PMANE. Overnight, people who were in active dialogue with the state officials and leadership, became criminals with a large number of cases foisted on them. Today, more than 55,000 people have FIRs filed against them, and more than 6800 are charged with waging war against the state and on grounds sedition - more than filed ever before, in a single police station, in such a short period of time. Udaykumar, the coordinator of PMANE is charged with murder, along with many other serious charges and remains in Idinthakerai - the crucible of the protest movement.

People's opposition to the KKNPP and the excessive, repressive reaction by the state against the protesters, requires that we, the citizens of this nation, ask ourselves some tough questions - on rights of the state versus the sovereignty of people - in a constitutional democracy. It demands that we understand and appropriate our constitutional rights which include right to life, right to livelihood, and right to protest - peacefully. This is what the protesters against KKNPP have been doing. Peaceful protests, like the ones conducted in Idinthakerai and other villages around KKNPP are touchstones of any vibrant, active, healthy democracy. These are processes for creating truly representative governments which act in trusteeship of  people and their interests. To demean a movement like PMANE as being either vested, or anti-national, or anti-development, is to deliberately mislead the people of this nation from the real issues that drive these protests. To further criminalize a peaceful, democratic, opposition movement as waging war against the state or as Seditious (i.e. dis-affectionate or dis-loyal to the State) goes  completely against the democratic principles on which this country is founded. One must remember that issues of democracy, do not require and cannot operate on the basis of either affection or loyalty towards state - it is precisely this act of disaffection or lack of loyalty that enables each of us, as individuals to remove, via the electoral process,  persons or party who no longer represent our interests. To charge peaceful protesters in a free and democratic India, with an act expressly constructed and applied by the British to repress India's freedom movement - is indicative of the harsh reality and repressive culture of India's political climate today. If protesters seeking to safeguard personal and community safety are now criminals waging war against the state, then it is time we, we all, really woke up to the reality of the State we live in - a State of Fear!

Death of Democracy

Democracy Died Today in Tamil Nadu. At 3 pm. Democracy died for men, women, young, old, and of all faiths, living in the vicinity of the Koodankulam power plant and opposed to this nuclear monstrosity for the last eight months - staking their all in this struggle for life.

Democracy Died today when people became mere pawns in political games of a powerful few, who could wilfully decide whose and how many lives should be sacrificed, when.

Democracy Died when national good was no longer about any larger or common or good; when the dictates of life or free will of many could be sacrificed to absurdities and whims of leadership with enormous and self-appropriated powers. Democracy is not a bully's weapon for imposing sacrifices on some, to benefit others.

Democracy Died today when fundamental rights to life and livelihood were bartered for the sake of money already spent, on an unnecessary technology - too risky for liability, and in areas of volatile seismicity - without consideration of benign alternatives.

Democracy died today with a single nod to the Koodankulam Nuclear Power Plant. And, yet, can the will of so many be denied? Will their voices and their will, not jolt the nation out of its slumber? Will this Death of Democracy itself bear seeds of a new generation, of true freedom, and of a truly awakened nation?

Why Koodankulam Nuclear Plant Cannot be Allowed to Happen: Voices of Women from the Area

To:

Hon’rable Chief Minister,

Tamil Nadu                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            16/3/12

Re: Why Koodankulam Nuclear Plant Cannot be Allowed to Happen: Voices of Women from the Area

Dear Madam,

We write to you as women against KKNPP and also as emissaries on behalf of mothers, sisters, daughters who have been in staunch and steadfast opposition to the project., KKNPP will irrevocably ruin lives and livelihood of many future generations, if allowed to  operate. We do want energy and electricity for our homes, villages and communities. Yet, as women, we resolutely oppose KKNPP because

1. We will not be mute observers to a real threat of a nuclear accident which depends on occurrence of natural disaster, guarantee of technical safeguards, and also, very importantly, human error and terrorist attack. To claim any nuclear plant is 100% safe is a deliberate falsehood.

2. The impact of radiation on biological and reproductive health of women and girls in particular has been well documented around nuclear power plants. We cannot endanger lives and health, current and future, of our families, our people, our communities, our land, our air , our water, our sea , and our seafood  because the GoI deems us expendable. We urge you to please put the welfare of the people of your state before the irrational nuclear ambitions of GoI.

3. Nuclear Energy is unnecessary. There are sufficient alternate and renewable options for Tamil Nadu. Immediate solutions include enormous gains via conservation (example switching to CFL bulbs, solar thermal water heaters) and reduction in transmission losses which eliminates the need for such large, complex, unsafe technologies.

4. Many countries are moving away from a nuclear option to meet their energy needs. Current generation nuclear technologies with a high cost of insurance undermine nuclear power being the 'cheapest' energy option - as promoted by the industry. Post Fukushima, and with China entering the photo-voltaic market, solar energy will soon be competitive in providing a viable safe and renewable power alternative.

5. KKNPP has unanswered and unresolved technical issues like the known seismic activity of the region; it is also the only nuclear plant in the world that depends entirely on the desalination plant for its entire fresh water supply. 

We write to you from Idinthakarai, the seat of people's opposition movement. What we saw here, inspired us and moved our hearts. Womenfar outweighed men in sheer numbers, their intensity, their loud and vocal opposition, and their complete commitment to the cause. We saw women sit for eight hours without food, water, carrying babies in their arms, and transfixed in attention to what was been spoken on the strage. They had taken to streets, under sun, rain and the elements, to protect their children and their future generations. Their faces showed that they had already crossed a threshold of no-return. They would protect their children and their lives at all cost. They have been at the forefront of a battle for life itself. We urge you, please, to take their side; please take our side, and call an immediate halt to this mindless project.

Arati Chokshi (People’s Union for Civil Liberties - PUCL)

Lalita Ramdas (Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament & Peace –CNDP)

Gowru Chinnapa (People’s Union for Civil Liberties - PUCL)

Raminder Kaur (Anthropologist)

Dipti Desai (JANASTU) &

Thousands of Women from the KKNPP Struggle Area 

Nuclear Hype and Reality of Uranium Mining

First the Hype.

"During the complete fission of 1 Kg U-235, 19 billion kilo calories are released, i.e. 1 Kg uranium-235 corresponds to 2.7 million Kg coal equivalent" .

Unsurprisingly, most of this propaganda originates from the beneficiaries of nuclear industry and their government sponsors.

Now, lets work out the real numbers - simply.

Method 1:
Lets work out what it takes to get this 1 Kg of uranium-235. In nature the component of this isotope of U-235 to total Uranium is 0.7%. Thus one has to mine 1/0.7% or (1000/7) Kg of total Uranium to get  Kg of U-235. Now the typical ore richness (i.e amount of Uranium to total material mined) is 1/2000; thus the total amount of mined material is 2000x1000/7 i.e. a million/3.5 more or about 300,000 Kg of mining. Thus a rough 'nuclear' advantage is about a factor of 10, rather than the about 3 million implied.

Method 2:


Each nuclear fission reaction produces 200 MeV of energy. In comparison, a thermal reaction for example, coal burning to carbon dioxide produces about 4 eV of energy. Thus each nuclear reaction releases 50 million times more energy compared to a chemical reaction. If we were to compare burning a tonne of coal, and fuel extracted from a tonne of Uranium ore( i.e a 3.5/million tonne), we again get nuclear to thermal advantage as

(3.5/million)x(12/235)x(50 million) = about 10!

Here the second term is the ratio of the atomic weights of carbon to Uranium and is a measure of atoms present per kilo of each material that will participate in thermal or nuclear reaction. Last term is the extra energy released in a nuclear fission compared to carbon burning.

Down Sides of Uranium Mining and the factor of ten nuclear advantage?

First of all, mining Uranium is unlike any other mining known to man.  An ore with 0.05% U is radioactive; even after  Uranium extraction, the remnant ore is still substantially radioactive. Although the uranium ore in geologic structures is usually stable, the mining processes release radioactive materials.  Particularly harmful are the acids or alkalies used to extract the mineral (via leaching) at the site itself, since these react with the ore material producing highly hazardous substances that infiltrate the aquatic ecosystems, causing irreparable environmental damage. Further, Uranium production is highly energy and water intensive.

Before considering any uranium mining, it is also necessary to consider the more obvious down sides of any nuclear power program, during operation, waste disposal, and the enormous,  unforgivable risk posed to life in case of an event or accident.

Current Affairs:


Recently, there has been a great deal of excitement and furor over the discovery of "Massive Deposits of Uranium in Andhra Pradesh with up to 150,000 tonnes of Uranium Ore deposits. This ore is of poor quality, and insufficient to meet the needs of our nuclear program. Yet with a typically pompous arrogance, our government is marching ahead, acquiring agricultural lands for conversions to cess-pools of toxic and radio- active waste, impervious to large public protests or outcry - all to combat Nation's 'future energy threat'.

It is high time we took over our Future, our Energy, and understood the real Threat to our Security.

Responding to UID

On Sept. 15, 2011, RS Sharma, Director General and Mission Director of UIDAI published an op-Ed in The Hindu. The following is my response to his article:

Need for identification to provide social welfare need not involve the rigors, expense and hazards of relying on technologically challenging, physically intrusive de-duplication scheme that is promised to us by UIDAI. 

While there  is no penal consequence to being Aadhar-less, it is increasingly becoming a requisite in many places; Maharashtra requires its employees to have UIDAI number to draw their salaries. The situation is much worse for the poor. The enrollment process is arbitrary and necessarily incomplete for the urban destitutes, migratory work force, vast population of the internally displaced persons, and also for the needy in remote and far flung areas. How the UIDAI aims to be an 'aadhar' for the unreachable, non-addressed, mobile sections of the society, who are also its most needy, is unclear. Further, tying up social welfare programs like NREGA and BPL provisions with UIDAI is not only unfair, but also cruel under these circumstances.

US and UK provide ample ID and benefits without requiring full(fool-)proof techno interventions against fraud or duplication. 

These examples cannot be ignored since such biometrically reliant UID systems were considered unfeasible (on account of margins of errors, amongst other reasons) even in these more technologically advanced nations, which are dealing with far smaller populations.

 

The poor in India, the labor class, old and malnourished have severe problems in biometrics measurements and this is well documented and also acknowledged by the authority. Rigorous and scientific feasibility studies to assess the margins of errors in biometrics have however not been conducted and the 'exception handling mechanism' in case of failures is yet to be disclosed. SSN scheme as in US, or a ration-card number in India might be sufficient if the primary interest is in providing social benefits. 

That the middle class of India is increasingly technologically proficient cannot be used to mandate UIDAI with ill defined, unregulated and enormous authority to access, appropriate and utilise highly private, personalised, complex data sets of our entire population (as defined by them). That this data system is also highly complex and susceptible to errors, human and technological, qualifies the program for substantial worry and minute scrutiny.

Additional concerns about UIDAI stem from its lack of legal sanction or sanction of law;  undisclosed, large and apparently elastic budget funded by taxpayers; its ties to Natgrid; safety, utilisation, and restrictions about sharing the data set. An idea that has recently taken hold of some of our imaginations, in reaction to elaborate UIDAI scheme, is to universalise basic rights to all citizens of this nation including food, water, shelter, education, health and security as a fundamental right garunteed by the constitution - and without getting an iris scan.

Nuclear Expansion and Human Costs: 10% of India at Risk

Continuing an order-of-magnitude calculation for India based on population densities around nuclear plants, I can estimate, roughly, the population at risk due to proximity to a nuclear plant. For a 50 mile (ie 80km) evacuation radius around the current and proposed nuclear power plants in India, I essentially get an identical plot as in the first post on this issue except each number is 16 times larger ( from a squared area factor between 20 and 80 km radius). A sum total of all these amounts to a whopping 122 million  i.e. 10%  of India's current population. This is the population living at risk of a nuclear incidence.

Are we willing to risk so many?

Open Letter to PM, EM,CM

Re: Police Destruction for Forced Land Aquistion in POSCO Affected Communities

Dear Mr. Minister,
It is a matter of utter shame that I write to you as a citizen of this nation. I am referring to the large scale destruction of beetle vines by police in Polang village under supervision by district administration of Jagatsingpur. This after State's assurance to media that there would be no land acquisition on 18th May.

Are we reduced to this, that those we elect to govern us, trample individual rights in favor of a profiteering, corporatised development? What and who determines the right to life and livelihood of our poor and or its sacrifice? and can lives lost and communities destroyed be compensated by any national, financial aspirations like increasing our GDP?

As a citizen, I only require this of you: that you uphold the constitution and respect the individual human rights written into it, as your primary sacred duty. That you solemnly consider , in brotherhood, that the poor also have a right to life and choice; our national needs of development can then be tackled collectively, without demanding too large a sacrifice from a few. With urgency I demand that you remove all police force from the Balithutha area, and revoke the section 144  imposed on the area, immediately. Forceful land acquisition, without the approval of palli sabha, constitutes a violations of FRA 2006 and is condemned.

You have the authority to set right, the series of ills set into motion by you personally. I request you to urgently do so.

Sincerely,

Arati Chokshi

Dr. Arati Chokshi

Bangalore

080-2360-2466

Yellow Yellow Dirty Fellow

Gugi, or Gogi as it is usually referred, in Gulbarga district of Karnataka, lies in the Bhima river basin, surrounded by hillocks on three sides. 75% of the district's area is used for agriculture with Krishna and Bhima rivers draining this district. The main agricltural products of the district are Jowar, Bajra, Tur, Gram, Sunflower, Groundnut,and Sugarcane. The above 'clickable' image is created using Google Earth; red line is 1km scale.

In this verdant food bowl, around Gogi, man has found Uranium. Aerial surveys and follow up mining explorations have revealed a deposit of 4000 tonnes of high grade Uranium ore. Of this, every year, 1.5 lakh tonnes of the ore will be trucked to Hyderabad 250 km away to yield 150 tonnes of uranium from the region. 

Two things are to be noted - that even in case of a rich deposit, every kilogram of ore gives you just 1 gram of uranium; which means that 4 million tonnes, or 4 billion kilos, over the lifetime of 15 years of this reserve will be trucked through the fields, across rivers and basins, forests, hills and living, thriving agricultural communities for processing. In its wake will follow ground water contamination, radiation pollutions, exposures, deformities, cancers and deaths..all well documented side-effects of uranium mining.

Local residents in Gogi are fearful and oppose the plant, as they should, given the poor safety directives and implementation record of UCIL( Uranium Corporation of India Ltd.) Future plans include exploiting Uranium from the entire Bhima belt between Sedam to Muddebihal, about 200 km apart. Yet, these reserves are likely to remain but drops in our nuclear energy bucket. Currently India produces 450 tonnes of Uranium per year.

It needs 7000 tonnes per year for its nuclear rollout. While India claims uranium reserves of 115,000 tonnes, a realistic estimate is more like 73,000 tonnes. That is, if we were to exploit ALL of India's uranium reserves, it might keep us going for about 10 years..only 10 years. So we are looking towards going from oil dependency to nuclear fuel dependency over the coming decades. Yet, none of this is preventing our government from its grandoise predictions, plannings and active implementations towards a very bright nuclear future to cover up the vast environmental destruction, human havoc, irreversible wreckage that it promises to leave in its wake.

I have now taken to singing a ditty from my childhood " Yellow, Yellow, Dirty fellow.." for the yellow uranium cakes, yellow cesspools, yellow jaundiced greed..dead yellow, dirty yellow, to cover green fields, clear rivers, forested hills, blue skies..I sing this ditty and I fight!

God Save My Country.

Who Needs more POWER

Here is my basic premise. India's energy consumption, like most of its other resource utilisation, is to a very large extent decoupled from meeting the needs of its masses. In India, as many as 400 million people have no access to electricity. And while the 8.8% growth in our GDP is celebrated and closely linked to a correlated growth in energy demands, it derives from active 'consumption' by the rich and the middle class,leaving the masses mostly outside its reach. Yet it is the poor who most often are forced to sacrifice for the country's inflated development needs and aspirations.

When the State uses force and fires on its own citizens to enforce compliance of the proposed national goals, it is time to review what drives these goals, who benefits and who pays. It is still with me, that within India's democratic framework, police - under state's authority - have a right to fire, on people protesting against an upcoming nuclear facility in their region; I am speaking of Jaitapur - although this holds for POSCOs, Green Hunts, and other developments, MoUs and projects that mandates a democratic state to eliminate democracy and shoot down its own citizens who are not willing to sacrifice quite-so-much for national good.

So...lets look at some numbers and figures.

The figure below shows the sector wise usage of electricity in India, with a largest consumption by industrial, followed by the domestic sector.

The source of this figure is given here. Lets bear in mind, to a large extent India's industry, and the 'questionable' fruits of this industry, remain outside the scope of rural India and its masses.The next set of figures show the predicted growth in each sector, and the total projected increase in the demand for electricity. It is seen that industrial growth far exceeds in total consumption and growth the total electricity demand made by any other sector. The figure is taken from here.

The above figures further show that due to the steeper rate of the industrial growth, this sector will form an increasing component of our energy requirements versus the domestic or the agricultural sectors. Thus the large power projects, nuclear, hydro, thermal or otherwise seem to be largely and a growing requirement of the industrial sector in India. Another way of seeing this effect is that the projected increase in total electricity (by just under a factor of 4) over a 40 year period is dominated by the projected growth in the industrial sector by a factor of 4.

The MoEF document (Fig 6) shows that while the ratio of urban to total population in the country for 2011 is about 30%, the GWh/year usage of electricity in rural sector is at least 2.5 lower compared to the urban consumption. The same document gives a breakup of the urban usages where the largest growth in the domestic electricity consumption is projected to be from air conditioners and heaters, compared to lighting, microwaves, televisions.Thus all our key markers, the GDP, its growth, electricity consumption, are preferentially stacked to benefitting the industrialised, urban and upper class, consuming communities.

Now the question is 'Why should those least benefited by development pay for the most benefited class?' , especially when this payment required, in the name of the larger common good, is with individual and community life, livelihood, land, water, health? Just so that the  rich and needy-others may have more cars, air conditioners, glitzy malls, wider roads, airports...to name but a few? By whose rule is this right or fair? And when will the benefits to our larger, democratic numbers dictate the path of development chosen by the those 'elected' to govern - on all our behalf?