Court issues notice on suit challenging Jaitapur n-plant

Mumbai, April 12 (IANS) The Bombay High Court Thursday issued notice to the government, Nuclear Power Corporation of India and others in a public suit challenging the proposed 9,900-MW Jaitapur Nuclear Power Project coming up in Ratnagiri in Maharashtra.

Justice D. D. Sinha and Justice V. K. Tahilramani issued the notice returnable next week, lawyer R.N. Kachwe for the activist-petitioner Hemant Patil said.

Patil contended that the JNPP could pose severe environmental and radiation hazards to the local population.

"I have demanded an independent commission of experts be constituted to look into all these aspects before the projects is given the go-ahead," Patil, who is also president of the anti-corruption NGO, Rashtriya Bhrastachar Virodhi Janshakti, told IANS.

He also urged the court appoint a Court Commissioner to verify the actual position of the entire project and its impact on human, wild life, flora and fauna and the sea waters.

The JNPP, planned in Madban-Jaitapur villages, has been facing stiff resistance from the locals and a majority of the state opposition parties since the past one-and-half years after it was cleared by the centre.

"We have prayed for injunction against the NPCIL and Areva of France, restraining them from proceeding ahead with the project till the pendency of the case," Kachwe said.