India going cheap

[fawwaxs]

Why does India continue to sell itself so cheaply to the West, particularly to the US? A case in point is the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill which the Congress-led UPA government is seeking to enact, in the face of strong opposition not only from the BJP and the Left but also from within its own ranks. Briefly, the Bill caps the damages paid to victims of a nuclear plant mishap at a total of Rs 2,800 crore, of which the private or public sector entity operating the plant will be liable for Rs 500 crore and the central government would stand good for the balance. The foreign company supplying the nuclear machinery or material will be free of all liability.

India must pass this Bill before foreign suppliers, from the US and elsewhere, can sell the nuclear equipment this country urgently needs if it is to meet its goal of increasing its nuclear generation 10 times over the next 25 years. The nuclear liability Bill will activate the so-called Indo-US nuclear deal in defence of which the prime minister almost resigned during the UPA government's previous tenure.

But even ardent champions of the Indo-US nuclear pact - which goes beyond nuclear issues and could help to establish India as a key partner of the US in regional and global affairs - are baulking at the limitation of liability, which former Indian attorney general Soli Sorabjee has described as 'discriminatory', unconstitutional and opposed to the 'polluter pays' principle prescribed by the Supreme Court. In short, there should be no cap on the damages paid to those who suffer as the result of a nuclear leak or other malfunction, nor should foreign suppliers be let off the hook in terms of liability in case an accident occurs.

Remember the Bhopal gas tragedy - perhaps the worst industrial disaster in the world - which in the 26 years since its occurrence seems to have been consigned to national amnesia? Barring some NGOs and victims' associations, everyone else appears to have misplaced in memory a toxic gas leak that reportedly took a toll of some 20,000 lives and caused severe bodily damage to almost 6,00,000 others. The culpable party, the Indian subsidiary of US-based Union Carbide, eventually paid a pittance - according to one calculation a scandalous Rs 12,410 per victim, compared with Rs 15 lakh to Rs 18 lakh given to the families of those who died in Delhi's Uphaar Cinema fire - by way of compensation to the affected, many of whom continue to suffer disease and severe disabilities to this day.

Suppose an Indian company had done a Bhopal in the US? Would that company - which was responsible for the deaths of many thousands of American citizens - have been allowed by the US authorities to get off as lightly as Union Carbide has done? Would an Indian company's CEO manage to escape the law, as did Union Carbide's boss, Warren Anderson, allegedly with the connivance of a senior Indian politician?

Why do we allow Indian lives to be made so cheap in comparison to American lives, or the lives of others who belong to what calls itself the 'developed world'? Isn't an integral part of its development the fact that it values the lives and security of its own citizens, unlike we in India who reveal our lack of development by criminally undervaluing the lives and safety of our people?

If we cannot learn to respect the right to life and health of our citizens we cannot expect others to respect this right, or to respect us. We need to remember this when the nuclear liability Bill is debated, not just in Parliament but also - and equally importantly - outside it.

And while we're at it, will the sarkar please send a belated supplementary Bill to the constituent of America Inc responsible for Bhopal? Better 26 years late than never.
India going cheap - Edit Page - Opinion - Home - The Times of India

 

[RobbieS]

Sometimes I am thankful for the Left's single minded opposition to anything Western. This one of those times.

 

[Chanakyaa]

Had it been anything other than the Democratic setup of India the Bill would have been passed... But thankfully the Multiparty Democratic system of India keeps a firm check even on a Gov with Full MARJORITY.A

THE BILL WAS NOT PASSED. THE INDIAN OPPOSITION KNOWS HOW TO PLAY CARDS.

THE BILL IN ITS CURRENT FORM CERTAINLY HAS BIG LOOPHOLES THAT MUST BE ADDRESSED.

 

[lhuang]

My professor today brought up the Union Carbide disaster, a bit off topic but there it is,

 

[Mallu]

I have full confidence in Political Parties in India.
They will not allow India Down

 

[paritosh]

Why does India continue to sell itself so cheaply to the West, particularly to the US? A case in point is the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill which the Congress-led UPA government is seeking to enact, in the face of strong opposition not only from the BJP and the Left but also from within its own ranks. Briefly, the Bill caps the damages paid to victims of a nuclear plant mishap at a total of Rs 2,800 crore, of which the private or public sector entity operating the plant will be liable for Rs 500 crore and the central government would stand good for the balance. The foreign company supplying the nuclear machinery or material will be free of all liability.

India must pass this Bill before foreign suppliers, from the US and elsewhere, can sell the nuclear equipment this country urgently needs if it is to meet its goal of increasing its nuclear generation 10 times over the next 25 years. The nuclear liability Bill will activate the so-called Indo-US nuclear deal in defence of which the prime minister almost resigned during the UPA government's previous tenure.

But even ardent champions of the Indo-US nuclear pact - which goes beyond nuclear issues and could help to establish India as a key partner of the US in regional and global affairs - are baulking at the limitation of liability, which former Indian attorney general Soli Sorabjee has described as 'discriminatory', unconstitutional and opposed to the 'polluter pays' principle prescribed by the Supreme Court. In short, there should be no cap on the damages paid to those who suffer as the result of a nuclear leak or other malfunction, nor should foreign suppliers be let off the hook in terms of liability in case an accident occurs.

Remember the Bhopal gas tragedy - perhaps the worst industrial disaster in the world - which in the 26 years since its occurrence seems to have been consigned to national amnesia? Barring some NGOs and victims' associations, everyone else appears to have misplaced in memory a toxic gas leak that reportedly took a toll of some 20,000 lives and caused severe bodily damage to almost 6,00,000 others. The culpable party, the Indian subsidiary of US-based Union Carbide, eventually paid a pittance - according to one calculation a scandalous Rs 12,410 per victim, compared with Rs 15 lakh to Rs 18 lakh given to the families of those who died in Delhi's Uphaar Cinema fire - by way of compensation to the affected, many of whom continue to suffer disease and severe disabilities to this day.

Suppose an Indian company had done a Bhopal in the US? Would that company - which was responsible for the deaths of many thousands of American citizens - have been allowed by the US authorities to get off as lightly as Union Carbide has done? Would an Indian company's CEO manage to escape the law, as did Union Carbide's boss, Warren Anderson, allegedly with the connivance of a senior Indian politician?

Why do we allow Indian lives to be made so cheap in comparison to American lives, or the lives of others who belong to what calls itself the 'developed world'? Isn't an integral part of its development the fact that it values the lives and security of its own citizens, unlike we in India who reveal our lack of development by criminally undervaluing the lives and safety of our people?

If we cannot learn to respect the right to life and health of our citizens we cannot expect others to respect this right, or to respect us. We need to remember this when the nuclear liability Bill is debated, not just in Parliament but also - and equally importantly - outside it.

And while we're at it, will the sarkar please send a belated supplementary Bill to the constituent of America Inc responsible for Bhopal? Better 26 years late than never.
India going cheap - Edit Page - Opinion - Home - The Times of India

the ToI people are the stupidest of the lost...
here this'd help you...the left and the BJP have for convenience sake gotten it all wrong...

The Bill, atomised

Suppose you ate at a restaurant and contracted food poisoning. Would you complain to the restaurant and its chefs? Or would you directly find fault with the butcher who supplied rotten meat to the restaurant, and the grocer who supplied it rotten vegetables?

Obviously, you would do the former, and leave it to the restaurant to resolve later whatever grouses it has with its suppliers of equipment and raw materials.

The principal objection of the BJP and the Left to the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill, 2010, is as inane as this. They want the vendors who supply equipment, components, raw materials, etc. to the operator of the nuclear power plant to be held directly liable to compensate the victims of nuclear accidents.

There is no doubt that India needs a law to govern compensation to be paid to the victims of nuclear accidents. India is the only major country — already operating as many as 18 nuclear power plants — which is not a member of either the 1963 Vienna Convention on Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), or the 1960 Paris Convention on Third Party Liability in the Field of Nuclear Energy of the Nuclear Energy Agency of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

In fact, India’s Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) proposed the passage of such a Liability Bill as long ago as 2000, and it has since formulated several drafts.

This is because there is no provision in the 1962 Indian Atomic Energy Act — or indeed in any other Indian Act — about liability for nuclear accidents.

Indeed, the liability cap of an Indian operator at Rs 500 crore per incident is well above those of several other countries. China has a liability cap of Rs 205 crore, Canada of Rs 335 crore, and France is about the same at Rs 575 crore.

The arguments of the Left parties are based on a faulty understanding of the US’s Price Anderson Act. In the US, all nuclear power plants are operated by the private sector, unlike in India, France and Russia where they are all operated by government companies. In the US, all the operators and equipment suppliers have pooled together to form a fund with a corpus of $10 billion. Compensation to the victims of a nuclear accident will be paid out of this fund according to a complex formula. The US government has no obligation whatsoever to compensate the victims of a nuclear accident. The Left parties are falsely claiming that the US has a liability cap of $10 billion. Payments out of this corpus for any one particular accident would be far far less than $10 billion.

It is not that suppliers of faulty equipment can get away scot-free. Clause 17 of the Bill permits the operator of the nuclear power plant to sue the equipment vendor for damages. This goes well beyond the provisions of IAEA’s model law. In particular, clause 17(b) of the Bill grants the Indian operator a ‘Right of Recourse’ against “wilful acts or gross negligence on the part of the supplier of the material, equipment or services, or of his employee”.

Indeed, the present Bill, which was pulled out last minute from being presented in the Lok Sabha on Monday, adheres to international best practices and is far better than the national laws of many advanced nuclear countries.

In addition to wanting vendors of equipment and raw materials to be directly liable, the BJP and the Left parties are also criticising the Rs 500 crore limit on the liability of the operator (Clause 6.2) as being far too low, and the supplementary liability of the Indian government beyond the operator’s liability of Rs 500 crore up to 300 million Special Drawing Rights (SDR), that is Rs 2,087 crore according to current exchange rates (Clauses 6.1 and 7a) as passing on the burden to the Indian taxpayer. They are also criticising the 10-year limit for claiming damages (clause 18) as being too short, arguing that several instances of biological damage show up only after several years.

But all these objections are contrary to both the Vienna and Paris Conventions, signed by over 80 countries. According to the IAEA, both the Vienna and Paris Conventions are based on the civil law concept and share the following main principles:

* Liability is channeled exclusively to the operators of the nuclear installations;

* Liability of the operator is absolute, i.e. the operator is held liable irrespective of fault;

* Liability is limited in amount. Under the Vienna Convention, it may be limited to not less than US $5 million, but an upper ceiling is not fixed. The Paris Convention sets a maximum liability of 15 million SDR;

* Liability is limited in time. Compensation rights are extinguished under both Conventions if an action is not brought within ten years from the date of the nuclear incident;

* The operator must maintain insurance of other financial security for an amount corresponding to his liability; if such security is insufficient, the Installation State is obliged to make up the difference up to the limit of the operator’s liability;

* Jurisdiction over actions lies exclusively with the courts of the contracting party in whose territory the nuclear incident occurred;

* Non-discrimination of victims on the grounds of nationality, domicile or residence;

In fact, the present Bill cuts short prolonged litigation by making the operator directly and immediately liable to pay compensation, without waiting to determine which piece of equipment from which specific vendor was defective. In a situation where an operator integrates thousands of pieces of equipment from myriad suppliers, it would not be easy to determine whose equipment was at fault.

A specific criticism of the Left parties is that the Bill is designed to favour American equipment vendors such as General Electric and Westinghouse. But the Bill does not mention suppliers from any particular country — its provisions are applicable to suppliers from all countries. Indeed, the Bill will benefit Indian vendors of nuclear equipment such as Larsen & Toubro, Walchand, Tatas, GMR and Lanco.

Essentially the Bill meets all international norms, and the objections of the BJP and the Left parties against it are not valid.


Ravi Visvesvaraya Prasad heads a group on C4ISRT (Command, Control, Communications and Computers Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance and Targeting) in South Asia.


link...
The Bill, atomised- Hindustan Times

 

[freddiemaize]

I kind of know that the present ruling party of Democratic India is good.

But what made them to try and pass such a low Bill? Anyone please!!

 

[paritosh]

I kind of know that the present ruling party of Democratic India is good.

But what made them to try and pass such a low Bill? Anyone please!!

read the report I posted...it's actually a good bill...
the liability amount is kept at 500 higher than in China...Russia...and at Par with France...

 

[jha]

if anything like bhopal happens again..the country responsible will be scre**d ...

 

[hardcore]

Sometimes I am thankful for the Left's single minded opposition to anything Western. This one of those times.

same here m8 i really would liked if left had some numbers and were in upa so that congress wouldn't sold out India to usa

 

[Bang Galore]

same here m8 i really would liked if left had some numbers and were in upa so that congress wouldn't sold out India to usa

Then there would not have been a nuclear deal in the first place. We need to stop this hysterical ranting about how the evil Americans are going to walk all over us. The bill is needed to grant limited immunity to private American & Japanese companies as against the Russians & the French companies who are covered by sovereign immunity because they are fully or partially controlled by governments. Too many people, it would seem suffer from reflexive anti-Americanism to allow for a rational debate.

 

[Justin Joseph]

I have full confidence in Political Parties in India.
They will not allow India Down

But MMS is pro US to the limit of blindness.

One can't expect out of box or strong willed from oldies like MMS or AB vajpaee or advani.

 

[Justin Joseph]

Then there would not have been a nuclear deal in the first place. We need to stop this hysterical ranting about how the evil Americans are going to walk all over us. The bill is needed to grant limited immunity to private American & Japanese companies as against the Russians & the French companies who are covered by sovereign immunity because they are fully or partially controlled by governments. Too many people, it would seem suffer from reflexive anti-Americanism to allow for a rational debate.

By nuke deal the restrictions have gone, we have got acces to frech and Russian technologies and uranium supply from all over the world.

And remember no string attached, no hidden agendas, no small letters

we can reuse the fuel

And it is cheap and supply is guaranteed.

the way US is still helping pakistan - china, don't expect much from them.

if they want our business and market or partnership it should be on mutual and equal basis

 

[chinapakistan]

By nuke deal the restrictions have gone, we have got acces to frech and Russian technologies and uranium supply from all over the world.

And remember no string attached, no hidden agendas, no small letters

we can reuse the fuel

And it is cheap and supply is guaranteed.

the way US is still helping pakistan - china, don't expect much from them.

if they want our business and market or partnership it should be on mutual and equal basis

US is helping chinabuddy, I think it is time to go back to Mars.