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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Kudankulam stalemate over, what next for the protestors? by G Pramod Kumar

Kudankulam stalemate over, what next for the protestors? by G Pramod Kumar

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published Published on Mar 21, 2012   modified Modified on Mar 21, 2012

Almost a month ago, when the Jayalalithaa-appointed state expert panel gave a clean chit to the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project (KKNPP), Firstpost had stated that the agitation was practically over. It was only a matter of time before the protesters were either asked to vacate the plant site or were forcibly removed.

Since then, the PMANE (People’s Movement Against Nuclear Energy) and the local struggle committee were essentially waging a losing battle. Them taking an anti-centre, anti-Karunanidhi and anti-Congress stand while appealing to Jayalalithaa not to support the plant was either politically naive or a conscious exercise in futility. Either way, it didn’t work.

Today, the agitation, which Jayalalithaa appeared to side with initially, is mostly a law and order issue. The government just wants to clear the activists with minimal trouble and has posted several companies of police, mostly mobilised from the southern districts.

But the PMANE and the local struggle committee are staying put. PMANE said that about 5,000 people are staying back at the protest site in Idinthakarai. Its top leadership is on a fast demanding release of their arrested “comrades”, among others.

Lying in wait is an equal number of police personnel.

It is only a matter of time before the situation either reaches a flashpoint involving some confrontation or fizzles out.

Will it be easy? Will PMANE be able to mobilise sizable crowds, particularly women, children and old people, that some of the contemporary agitations in the country have been employing as human shields? Will the police be able to clear them without harm, if they continue to be stubborn?

The state government has been planning ever since the panel gave its report. It had deputed an ADGP to assess the law and order situation almost a month ago and since yesterday has deployed at least 5,000 police personnel. The ADGP has reportedly assessed every possibility and the state government is ready with its plan.

PMANE said on Tuesday morning that 18 persons in Kudankulam and 185, along with a Parish priest, in a nearby village have been arrested. Nine leaders of the struggle committee, arrested early yesterday, have been booked for sedition among other charges.

The main plan of the police is to take the sting out of the agitation and prevent further aggregation of people. It has passed prohibitory orders (144) in the area and blocked all roads leading to the protest site at Idinthakarai. However, about 300 people from nearby villages took to boats and came by sea, which the police had overlooked. Now the coastal belt is also being guarded. CISF personnel, mobilised from Kerala have been handed over the control of the coast. Sorties by a couple of Dornier aircrafts added a sense of aerial surveillance among the villagers.

The police plan is also to prevent supplies reaching the site. PMANE said they are worried about possible public health problems and food shortage.

Interestingly, the police hasn’t yet arrested the top leadership of PMANE including SP Udayakumar and Pushparayan, both of whom are on an indefinite fast at the protest site, demanding release of the arrested agitators, withdrawal of cabinet resolution, complete probe into the safety issues, release of the inter-governmental agreement between India and Russia and conduct of safety and evacuation drills in the 30-km radius of the KKNPP.

It seems the police plan is to gauge the local response before removing Udayakumar, Pushparayan and others. The arrest of the nine leaders including the struggle committee member S Sivasurbamanian seems to be a trial run before they clamp on the rest. The prohibitory order will stay on till 2 April and the site is likely to be cleared by then.

Udayakumar said that the district collector had called him and Pushparayan to his office to discuss some safety-related questions ahead of the cabinet decision and he suspected that it was a plan to detain them; therefore he refused the invitation.

In terms of the sops for the local population, the 500-crore welfare package announce by Jayalalithaa yesterday along with the cabinet decision to go ahead with the plant include considerable infrastructure development such as facilities for boat repairs, cold storage, housing and roads.

Meanwhile, about 300 personnel of the KKNPP have entered the plant to begin restoration of pre-commissioning work.

Although the decks have been cleared and the construction and preparation for an early commissioning begun, things are not going to be smooth within the plant. Sources in the Nuclear Power Corporation Indian Limited (NPCIL) said that the last seven months of inactivity and blockade have caused considerable delay in the process. The whole pre-commissioning process has to be re-run. For instance, the cooling water will have to be replaced and the equipment checked for possible corrosion and rectification. The stalemate has also led to the growth of weeds in the premises. “There is a lot of work to be done,” they said.

Meanwhile, all political parties in the state except the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) and industry organisations have welcomed the state government decision while environmental and human rights organisations such as the Greenpeace and PUCL have condemned the police action and arrests.

FirstPost.com, 20 Marc, 2012, http://www.firstpost.com/india/kudankulam-stalemate-over-now-what-250402.html


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