Scrap Kudankulam nuclear plant project: Swami Agnivesh

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Demanding that the Centre immediately scrap the Kudankulam Nuclear power project, activist Swami Agnivesh today demanded that a high-level panel should visit the KNPP site to address fears of locals there.

"I demand that the government scrap the plant and initiate an alternative source of clean energy. An independent panel, comprising national and international experts of credible records, should visit the site and a public hearing should be held," he told reporters after visiting KNPP in Tamil Nadu.

Since the legal system or Right to Information Act were "helpless" in the case of Kudankulam, a higher level of inquiry -- much more than Lokpal and Lokayukta -- was needed to expose corruption, he said.

"Why has Russia given up on nuclear energy after the Chernobyl disaster and not a single plant has been set up? Why has Japan, a technologically advanced country, decided to dismantle all nuclear power plants in the near future after Fukushima?

"Why has Germany, another highly-industrialised country, decided to go non-nuclear for its energy requirements and dismantle their existing plants by 2020?," he asked to validate his point.

Agnivesh criticised former President A P J Abdul Kalam for giving a clean chit to KNPP and claimed that eminent geologists and nuclear scientists had told him that the project was not at all safe for an atomic plant.

He alleged that the Tamil Nadu government had not taken precautionary steps in Kudankulam area in the wake of the tsunami alert issued yesterday.

The activist urged Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa to withdraw all sedition charges slapped on campaigners against the project.