[Reader-list] Fwd: Nuclear Power: An Open Letter to Indian Left Parties

[Anivar Aravind]

--------- Forwarded message ----------
From: S. P. Udayakumar <koodankulam at yahoo.com>


People's Movement Against Nuclear Energy
          October 2, 2008
42/27 Esankai Mani Veethy
Parakkai Road Junction
Nagercoil 629 002
Tamil Nadu





To

The National Executive Members
Communist Party of India
Ajoy Bhavan
15, Kotla Marg
New Delhi 110 002

The Central Committee Members
Communist Party of India (Marxist) A.K. Gopalan Bhawan 27-29, Bhai Vir
Singh Marg New Delhi 110 001



The Central Committee Members
All India Forward Bloc
28, Gurudwara Rakab Ganj Road
New Delhi 110 001


The Central Committee Members
Revolutionary Socialist Party
17, Firoz Shah Road
New Delhi 110 001

The Central Committee Members
Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation
U-90, Shakarpur
Delhi 110 092

Dear Comrades:


We, the members of the People's Movement Against Nuclear Energy, would
like to congratulate the Leftist parties and leaders in India on your
principled opposition to American imperialism that seeks to dominate
our national life. We would also like to thank you for problematizing
the India-US nuclear deal and popularizing the issue across the
country among all sections of our society. The Leftist parties and
leaders are the only hope of India to create awareness on
people-friendly development paradigm; alternative energy generation;
elimination of war and weapons of mass destruction; and transparency,
accountability and popular participation in our national affairs.

It is our humble submission that only the Leftist parties and leaders
can shift the course of our national economy, politics and history in
India and pave a new way for our collective salvation and freedom.
After all, human society is based on "production of products" and
"production of life." Humans act on Nature with the help of
instruments to get products. Such a production of products must be
based on needs; but now it is all done with greed damaging the Nature
irreparably. Should humanity continue on the Earth, Nature should be
protected! For the "production of life," Nature should be pristine so
that future generations could thrive on our planet.

However, the contemporary world operates with a wrong understanding of
"development" that has its focus on indiscriminate industrialization,
liberalization, privatization, globalization, monetization [and
Americanization] with complete disregard for Nature, future, the
interests of the labor, the safety and well-being of unborn
generations, and other such externalities.

India's ruling class says that if India has to achieve and sustain the
desired growth level of 9-10 percent, the country has to have energy
security, or as some nationalist leaders put it, energy independence.
In India, electricity has always been considered to be a development
input but now it has come to be regarded as a tradable commodity. Of
the 593,732 villages in India (1991 census) 474,982 have been
electrified with the remarkable 80 percent electrification. But if we
look at the electrification of rural households, we see a different
picture. There are some 138.3 million rural households (2001 census)
in India but only 60.2 million of them have access to electricity and
the electrification percentage is only 44 percent. So it is not that
electricity is not available in their villages for these rural
households but they simply cannot afford it. It is poverty that
prevents them from accessing electricity.

 Although India has more or less sufficient quantity of electricity
today, a considerable portion of our electricity is said to be wasted
because of technical and commercial factors. Some 40% of electricity
is lost in transmission because of energy dissipation in conductors
and equipment used for Transmission and Distribution (T&D). Pilferage,
defective meters, error in meter reading, error in estimating
unmetered supply are other reasons for this huge wastage of
electricity. So the challenges India faces today include reducing and
eliminating T&D loss, improving the quality of supply and delivery
systems, providing electricity for all at affordable price, and
improving the economic lot of all the people across the country.

Ignoring all these socioeconomic-political intricacies and
complexities, India's ruling class seeks a scientific-technical
solution for the energy issue and keeps chanting the nuclear mantra.
They completely overlook the facts that there have been no new nuclear
power stations built in the United States for the past 35 years and in
Russia for almost 22 years, and that many European countries are
phasing out their nuclear power program. There is hardly any debate
about the enormous amount of dangerous nuclear waste we will
accumulate from the nuclear power plants, the need to safeguard this
"hazmat treasure" for 48,000 years, huge amounts of heavy metals
discharged by light and heavy water reactors, radiation blues, shoving
around fissile material, nuclear weapons proliferation, and Armageddon
on the Earth.

In fact, American, Russian and French capitalists try to dump their
nuclear technology on India for their own survival and profit. Global
capitalism turns any calamity to its advantage, and it puts forward
nuclear power as the answer for climate change. If we look closely,
mining and processing of uranium, building nuclear power stations with
so much cement and steel, the long construction process, the
decommissioning of the plants, and handling the radioactive waste -
all cause considerable climate-changing pollution.

Just as nuclear power is not an answer for climate change, it is not a
panacea for our energy needs. As the People's Democracy and many of
the Leftist leaders have pointed out, the contribution of nuclear
power to the national grid has been so small and will continue to be
so even after the India-US nuclear deal comes into effect. Nuclear
power is also more expensive than any other mode of electricity
generation.

Global capitalism promotes nuclear power as the single solution for
all the world's energy woes and its economic development. In India, so
much money has already been wasted on nuclear power projects that are
expensive, inefficient and troublesome. Since the current cash crunch
is mainly due to nuclear power being very expensive and capital
intensive, Indian nuclear establishment has expressed interest in
inviting private investments and amending nuclear laws to facilitate
privatization. What all this means is that while private companies
make money with no responsibilities whatsoever, Indian taxpayers and
the "ordinary citizens" will bear the cost of dealing with all the
liabilities such as nuclear waste, possible accidents, public health
issues and other dangerous consequences.

 The international and Indian capitalists will thrive at the cost of
India's poor. National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganized
Sector reveals that 320 million Indian workers live on less than 20
rupees a day. The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) has recorded
1,66,304 farmers' suicides in a decade since 1997. There were 17,060
farmers' suicides in 2006 alone across India. All these mean that
there has been one farmer's suicide every 30 minutes since 2002 (The
Hindu, January 31, 2008). When our people lack basic food security,
water security, sanitation security, job security, and human security,
energy security is bandied about to promote the interests of the rich
and powerful.

 Nobody except the Leftists dares to challenge any nuclear activity in
the country. In fact, the present
pro-military-industrial-academic-complex-thinking considers uranium
mining, nuclear power plants, nuclear weaponization, nuclear deals
with Americans, Russians and the French, and strategic partnerships
with them as integral parts of being a patriotic Indian. Nuclearism
has been part and parcel of the Northern capitalist development
paradigm and the UPA government is underscoring this aspect to gain an
upper hand in the national political game. An unequivocal
problematization of this mainstream understanding of "development" has
become the need of the hour.

A highly populated country like India does have an increasing need for
energy.  But that energy has to be economical, sustainable and
environment-friendly for the same reason of having over- and dense-
population.  The country needs to spend less on energy because there
are other pressing needs such as health, education, housing,
transportation and so forth.  India cannot afford the "use and
discord" strategy as in nuclear power projects for obvious reasons of
limited land availability, reliance on the sea and sea food, future
generation's interests and so forth.  Its energy projects have to be
environmentally-friendly because even a small incident can harm, hurt
or kill a huge number of people.

 Nuclear power is beset with threats and dangers that can encompass
the most improbable meteorite fall to the commonplace terrorist
attack. For instance, The Hindu newspaper (September 6, 2006) reported
that a meteorite fell at Kanvarpura village near Rawatbhata, where
Rajasthan Atomic Power Plant is situated, on August 29, 2006. The
[Geological Survey of India Deputy Director-General (western region)
R. S. Goyal] said the meteorite could have caused devastation on an
'unimaginable scale' if it had fallen on the Rawatbhata Atomic Power
Plant. Presiding over a crucial day-long meeting of the Chief
Ministers on Internal Security, the Indian Prime Minister said
terrorist outfits planned possible terrorist attacks on vital
installations including nuclear establishments (The Hindu, September
6, 2006). In fact, two armed men were reportedly seen moving in the
inner fencing area around the Kakrapar nuclear power plant in Gujarat
(The Hindu, August 23, 2006). The plant was declared safe later
without much elaboration.

Most importantly, nuclearism is a global political ideology that
cannot stomach any transparency, accountability or popular
participation. It snubs dissent, denounces opponents and creates a
political climate of fear and retribution. With the India-US nuclear
deal, and the deals with Russia and France and the private
participation in nuclear energy generation, the situation is going to
get out of hand. The combination of profiteering companies, secretive
state apparatus and repressive nuclear department will be ruthless and
this nexus of capitalism, statism, nuclearism and communalism does not
augur well for the country. These forces gaining an upper hand in our
national polity will mean a death knell for the country's democracy,
openness, futures and sustainable development.

When the beginning of the 21st century provides India a historic
opportunity to be a world-leader by building on our traditional
strengths such as sustainable development and appropriate technology,
our elites are forcing us to be American stooges with war-based values
and wasteful lifestyle.

The way out of this capitalistic and imperialistic quandary is to be
progressive and being progressive does not necessarily mean going back
to the days of pastoral simplicity. We need to strive for Green
alternatives for our modern needs. The Leftists with Green values
would be a boon for the country at this hour of crisis.

We would like to present you with a concrete example. We are sure you
have heard about the Koodankulam nuclear power plant that is being
constructed in the Koodankulam village on the Gulf of Mannar in
Tirunelveli district of Tamil Nadu. The Government of India is
constructing two 1000 MW light water VVER nuclear power plants with
Russian technology and loans. They have not released any Environmental
Impact Assessment (EIA) report, or the safety analysis report or the
site evaluation study for the first two plants they are constructing.
Nor have they conducted any public hearing to hear what the people of
southern Tamil Nadu and Kerala have to say about the construction of
these two nuclear power plants. We in southern Tamil Nadu and Kerala
are very concerned about this undemocratic and anti-people
multimillion dollar project that is thrust down our throats in the
name of "development" and "energy security."

Neither the Government of India nor the Department of Atomic Energy
(DAE) has shared any information about the Koodankulam plants or
anything about the overall nuclear energy plans with any kind of
transparency, democratic spirit or civic responsibility. They spread
rumors and gossips about their plans and intentions and when these
"unconfirmed reports" circulate among the public for sometime and gain
some negative acceptance, they confirm the hearsays. The Nuclear Power
Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL) has decided to increase the
number of reactors at Koodankulam to eight (The Hindu, September 25,
2006). The National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) also has proposed
to establish nuclear power plants in or near Koodankulam with the
generating capacity of 2000 MW power (The Hindu, September 6, 2006).
So, as a recent newspaper report confirms (The Hindu, September 11,
2008) Koodankulam will be the largest mega nuclear complex with almost
10,000 MW generation capacity.

Some of the RTI enquiries to the district collectors of a few southern
Tamil Nadu and southern Kerala districts reveal how woefully
inadequate they are about the nuclear safety arrangements and
emergency preparedness. The India-Russia agreement on Koodankulam
stipulated first that Russia would take the nuclear waste but now it
has been decided that the waste will remain in India. There is hardly
any discussion or consciousness among the political or bureaucratic
circles about the nuclear waste issues, decommissioning questions,
radiation hazards, future impact on our seas, fish and so forth.
Nuclear waste management is going to be a major headache for our
people. That is why D. D. Kosambi branded nuclear power as a "menace
that even the unborn generations have to deal with." He further said,
"only opportunists and third rate scientists spend their time and
energies on nuclear power."

Our people in the southern districts of Tamil Nadu and Kerala are
taking a clear and bold stand that these nuclear power plants are not
in the best interests of us and these projects should be stopped for
ever. The Koodankulam mega nuclear complex will have disastrous
consequences for all of us, the Tamils, the Malayalees, and even the
Sinhalese and the Maldivians in the neighboring countries.

Friends in Kerala have had such a fine record of fighting for the
Silent Valley, against the soft-drink companies' stealing their water
resources etc. They took such a courageous stand in not having any
nuclear power plants in Kerala because of the over and
dense-population in the state. But the Government of India has pushed
the plant just a little outside their state boundary and set up the
plant right across their front door.

When 10 nuclear power plants release the coolant effluents into the
sea on daily basis for the next four to five decades, one can think of
the impact and repercussions that will have on all our air, our land,
our water, our sea, our fish, our cattle, our children, our fathers
and mothers, our health, and our future. The vested interests are
trying to set our common home on fire in the name of energy security
and national security. How about our human security? Our food
security? Our air security? The security of our children who speak and
sing in Tamil, Malayalam, Sinhalese and Divehi? Their songs and dances
and their dreamy futures?

This corner may be the "End of India" for the rest of India! But for
us, this has been the beginning of India, the beginning of life, the
beginning of everything! This place, this little corner of hills and
high seas, rivers and forests, and ponds and paddy fields, is full of
beginnings for us. This is where our life began, our history began,
our culture began, our speech, our memories, our meanings, our dreams
and desires – all began. But what will come off this beautiful place?

Almost all our political parties, politicians, bureaucrats, religious
leaders, and many NGOs have turned a blind eye to the nuclear issue.
When people ask some uncomfortable questions about the nuclear
project, we are often branded as unpatriotic, anti-national, and even
CIA agents. It is quite ironic that the Indian elites call the people
who oppose the nuclear program CIA agents when they themselves are
selling the country to the Americans.

Only the Leftists can and may tell us that we, the working class of
India and the neighboring countries, are all human beings, that we all
have a common home, the south of South Asia, that the sea is part and
parcel of our home, and that fish is the most important food for us
all. In short, the people of the south of South Asia share the same
destiny of nuclear agony and only the Leftists can see this at the
larger international picture and offer us a way out. Some Leftists
tend to think that it is only the United States we should oppose and
not nuclear energy per se or nuclear cooperation with Russia or
France. Russia, like America, is also a capitalistic country and is
interested in selling their nuclear technology to India in order to
make some quick bucks.

It is high time the Left all over India took an unambiguous stand
against expensive, inefficient, dangerous waste-producing,
weapons-proliferating, Nature-harming, future-hurting,
children-killing, colonizing and enslaving nuclear energy without
riders and exceptions and ifs and buts! Nuclearism is no more an
energy issue or a scientific matter but a life-threatening political
issue. The Left parties and leaders can and must make a difference in
the nuclear issue just as you have done in the ongoing global
financial crisis. Hoping that you would take this appeal seriously and
lead us to better futures, we send you our best personal regards and
all peaceful wishes.


Cordially,

S. P. Udayakumar, George Gomez, C. Boaz
Coordinators
People's Movement Against Nuclear Energy
Ph: 04652-240657; 9865683735