The Hindu

Udupi, Mar 26: Manorama Madhwaraj, MP, has urged the Union Government to shelve the proposed 1,015 MW coal-based Nagarjuna Power Project at Yellur in Udupi district, as the people of Udupi and Dakshina Kannada districts were opposed to it for environmental reasons.

In a letter written to Union Home Minister Shivraj V Patil, the copies of which were released to the press, Ms. Madhwaraj said that the people of the two districts had been opposing the project for two decades as this was an ecologically sensitive region.

Reports submitted by Danish International Development Agency, National Environmental Engineering Research Institute, and the State of Environment Report 2003 compiled by the Karnataka Government, said that the area encircled by the Western Ghats on three sides and Arabian Sea to the west was unsuitable for coal-based power plant even with the flue gas desulphurisation technology, she said. Such a project would affect agriculture, fishing and human health.

A comprehensive writ petition challenging the viability of the project was pending in the Karnataka High Court, she said. The issue was now "becoming a serious matter of law and order in coastal Karnataka," she said, adding that a situation similar to Nandigram and Singur was being created in the area.

The Centre should intervene "before the situation goes out of control and people take law into their own hands," Madhwaraj added.