'India should avoid excesses in quest for economic progress'

MUMBAI: As protests continue against the proposed nuclear power plant at Jaitapur in Maharashtra to be built with France's help, French President Nicolas Sarkozy today said that India should avoid committing "excesses" in its ongoing quest for economic progress.

Addressing business leaders at the Taj Mahal Hotel, he conceded to "the excesses committed by the developed world a century ago", and said India should avoid taking the same path.

"If you do what we did a century ago, your people will pay the price for it," Sarkozy said in his extempore speech to representatives of India Inc.

It is a "non-choice" to choose between development and environment, he said, adding, there is a need to make development environmentally sustainable.

The 9,900 MW nuclear power project at Jaitapur to be built by French company, Areva, at a cost of over USD 25 billion is facing resistance from locals and environmental activists who fear that the project would have an adverse impact on the ecologically-sensitive Konkan region and also hurt marine life.