New Delhi, Dec 10

The Supreme Court Monday issued notice to the central government on a petition seeking that further steps for commissioning of the Kudankulam nuclear plant be put on hold till the compliance of the apex court's 15 directions concerning its safety and disaster management.

The notice was also issued to the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board, Nuclear Power Corporation of India, and Tamil Nadu.

A petition by G. Sundarrajan sought the compliance of 15 directions issued by the apex court by its May 6, 2013 order before the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project was operationalised.

A bench headed by Justice K.S. Radhakrishnan issued notice on the petition which challenged the Madras High Court's July 29 order, dismissing Sundarrajan's plea.

The high court said that if the directions of the apex court had not been complied with by the authorities in letter and spirit, then it was always open to him to move the apex court about the non-compliance of its directions.

The apex court by its May 6 order had said that the directions relating to environment protection, disaster management, safety of the people, and quality of systems and components in the plant should be complied with by the authorities before commissioning of the KKNPP.

In his petition, Sundarrajan said: "After the judgment of the Supreme Court, no steps whatsoever have been taken either by AERB or by NPCIL to effect a fresh review of the quality of various components and safety of system in KKNPP..."

He noted that some of these were supplied by the two Russian companies - Zio Podalsk and ATOM- Industriya (subsidiaries of Rosatom) whose heads were arrested by Russian government itself on the ground that those companies were supplying to various nuclear power plants all over the world substandard nuclear components.

Urging the apex court to ensure full compliance of its directions, the petitioner contended that the AERB had July 4 given clearance for commissioning of the KKNPP without satisfying itself that all the apex court's directions were duly complied with by the authorities.

By:IANS