Three aid groups shut over anti-nuclear power protests in India

New Delhi: India has shut down three aid organisations it says were diverting foreign funds towards rallying protests against a Russian-built nuclear plant in the south, but at least one group on Saturday denied any involvement in the protests while another said its funds were homegrown.

Activists opposed to India expanding its atomic energy portfolio have argued that the Japan Fukushima nuclear disaster caused by a massive earthquake and tsunami in March showed such plants were vulnerable to natural disaster.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh insists that India needs nuclear power to help fuel its booming economy and that Indian installations are safe.

After months of protests against the new plant in Tamil Nadu, the prime minister last week accused unnamed foreign interests — mainly in the United States and Scandinavia — of stirring anti-nuclear sentiments without understanding India's electricity needs.

Investigation

On Friday, a day after the Russian and Indian foreign secretaries held talks in New Delhi, the Indian government said it was cancelling the licences of three aid groups it accused of illegally funding protests that had delayed plans for firing up the first of two Russian-built 1,000-megawatt reactors in December.

It did not name the groups or give details from where exactly the funding was suspected of coming, saying only that a Home Ministry investigation showed overseas funds meant for helping the physically handicapped and eradicating leprosy were instead being used for anti-nuclear protests.

But one group, the Tuticorin Diocese Association, said it had been unfairly targeted in the crackdown despite having no involvement in protests that have blocked highways and featured public fasts to demand the plant's closure.

"We are being victimised," Father William Santhanam said by telephone yesterday from the Tuticorin diocese in Tamil Nadu. "Maybe because the bishop expressed sympathy with his people's fears about the plant, but that is his job. When there is an earthquake, a flood, any other reason for public upset, the government wants us to be there. But not now."

Anti-nuclear campaigner S.P. Udayakumar also objected to his People's Education for Action and Liberation being shuttered, saying there was no proof to support the prime minister's allegations of overseas funding. "We strongly deny his observation that the agitation is being funded by other countries," Udayakumar was quoted yesterday by The Hindustan Times as saying.