NALCO issue triggers crisis for Naveen Patnaik Govt.

By Our Special Correspondent

BHUBANESWAR, JAN. 12. The 11-month-old BJD-BJP Government in Orissa led by Mr. Naveen Patnaik is heading for yet another crisis as politicians and environmentalists have stepped up their campaign over the inundation caused by a breach in the ash pond of the National Aluminium Company (NALCO) at its captive power plant at Angul, 160 km from here, on the December 31 last year. Several villages in and around the captive power plant were inundated by a flash flood caused by a breach in the second ash pond.

Addressing newsmen here today, the president of the Orissa unit of the Janata Dal (S), Mr. Ashok Das, said the impact of the breach would be felt by over five lakh people living on the banks of the rivers Brahmani and Kharasrota. Mr. Das said that he had information that several cattle perished after consuming the contaminated water of these rivers. The State Government should immediately arrest the chairman of the NALCO for criminal negligence.

Mr. Das, after a visit to the affected areas said he had been informed that cracks had started developing in the first ash pond of NALCO and there was an urgent need for immediately shutting down the captive power plant. Regretting that the State Government had not done anything positive in this regard, Mr. Das said the situation was going to become severe in the coming days as people would be forced to inhale ash in and around Angul town while the people in the downstream would have to depend on the contaminated water. He said there was an urgent need for deep tube wells not only in Angul but also in all the villages which depend on the two rivers.

Mr. Das said that the State Government should also consider setting up a quasi-judicial body to monitor the activities of all the industries in the State.

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