New Delhi, Aug 22 (IANS) The amended nuclear liability bill too faces objections from the opposition National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and the Left parties ahead of a discussion on it in parliament Wednesday.
Leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) said there appeared to be ‘further deviations’ from the text of the agreed bill, while the Left alleged that the new amendments in the bill again let the foreign nuclear suppliers off the hook.
The final text of the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill, 2010 has not yet been officially published.
The cabinet Friday made amendments in the legislation to address the concerns raised by the opposition parties. The government wants to move the bill for discussion Wednesday, when parliament re-assembles after the Raksha Bandhan break.
The latest contentions have arisen over the reported amendment in section 17(b), which empowers the Indian operator of a nuclear facility to sue the foreign supplier of any defective equipment involved in a nuclear accident only if the supply was ‘made with the intent to cause nuclear damage’.
Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha and BJP leader Arun Jaitley said the ‘language of the amendment, as newly framed, substantially nullifies the suppliers liability’.
‘It now appears there is a deviation from the orginal text which was agreed upon between the government and the BJP,’ Jaitley told IANS.
BJP spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman told IANS that the BJP ‘will object to any changes which dilutes the liabilities of the suppliers’. ‘We will stand up in the house and object to those unwarranted changes,’ she said, adding the liability of the nuclear supplier supplier was a vital issue to be fixed.
Communist Party of India (CPI) secretary D. Raja said that the ‘government appears to be acting under the pressure of multi-national corporations’.
‘They should have learnt some lessons from the Bhopal gas tragedy,’ he said, adding his party will oppose the bill if the amendments have been made deliberately to help the suppliers.
Communist Party of India-Marxist politburo member S. Ramachandran Pilla told IANS that the ‘government was moving from one flip-flop to another’.
‘They (the government) want to push the bill in a hush-hush and confusing way. They have been trying to divide the opposition too,’ he alleged.
Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari, however, told IANS that the government had ‘attempted to reach the widest possible consensus on the bill’.
‘Any further discussion on a bill, which is to be discussed in parliament, is premature,’ he added.
