Bond, Nuclear Bond
If I were to tell you that the latest Bond flick is being filmed in India and that its master set is almost ready a short distance from the country’s southernmost tip, would you believe it? Inside Koodankulam—India’s Russia-supported answer to a ‘safe’ nuclear power plant—is nothing less than what you see in those humongous tech-savvy sets from Bond movies. Heavy security, fortress-like walls, hundreds of people working tirelessly in deep pits, an underlying yet unfounded fear that a touch of a button may reduce the world to cinders. All the masala to fill your imagination. Minus the babes, of course.
With its sensitive position, Koodankulam can, like Bond, claim to be a place where no (common) man has gone before. Located on the coast of the Gulf of Mannar, 25 km northeast of Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu, the similarity between the nuke site and a Bond episode seems unending. We are warplane-proof, cyclone-proof, tsunami-proof and earthquake-resistant, says R.S. Sundar, Koodankulam’s site director proudly. Sundar’s energy, of course, has been consumed more by the protests of activists and locals, not to mention getting sandwiched in the Centre-state drama. KKNPL (Koodankulam Nuclear Power Plant), after all, is the Centre’s baby while Tamil Nadu is Amma’s.
KKNPL has four units, of which Unit One is inching towards ‘criticality’, which, in nuke lingo, means ready to launch. Unit Two is not far behind and may go critical in less than a year. Inside, armed-to-the-teeth CISF men make up the multi-layered security leading up to the power plant. What takes the cake is the six-feet super concrete wall, flood-proof doors and a stainless-steel double containment casket which is there to protect the reactor from any calamity, minor or major.
The Koodankulam site is located far off—about 1,500 km—from the tsunamigenic fault (where tsunamis originate) unlike Fukushima which was just 130 km from a tsunami zone. But the villagers don’t know this so Sundar and his team are busy giving them facts like these. Which is why when they are not attending to atomic configurations, key scientists are now taking lessons in communication, writing and media skills. Their efforts outside of the site, mostly plainspeaking with the villagers, has slowly begun yielding positive results.
White Russian, Nude Beach
In a sensitive location predominantly infested with ‘southies’ (a larger part of the KKNPL scientific community is from Kerala and Tamil Nadu), finding a Hindi-speaking north Indian can be a rarity. Indeed, you are much more likely to run into a white-skinned Russian. There are as many as 200 Russians working at various critical levels in the reactor units. Some of them have even moved here with families into the residential campus a few kms away, having been here since the project took off 10 years ago. Living like the locals (eating/shopping/studying at the same place where local nuke employees do), the only visible place where they enjoy exclusivity is the private beach along the KKNPL residential complex. Russians only, barks the CISF guard, pointing towards one half of the beach, protected by shrubs and greens, which prevents ‘Indians’ from gawking. One place where the goras can let their hair, or clothes, down.
Windmills of the Gods
Of course, there is more to Kanyakumari district than the KKNPL nuke site. For several kilometres en route to the location, in the rain-shadow belt, you are suddenly greeted by hundreds of massive windmills. Part of a Rs 1,500-crore project of the Tamil Nadu government to generate 1000 MW of electricity. From a distance, the wind turbine generators seem like a huge playground with hundreds of children running with paper fans against the wind. As the curving road opens up into Kanyakumari, the army of coconut palms are suddenly dwarfed by the towering windmills. Hundreds of them, with their massive blades slicing the wind with alarming speed.
The Rock Star
Kanyakumari nahin dekha to kya dekha? The southernmost tip of India may have its geographical significance, having learnt and relearnt it a million times in our textbooks. Your excitement at ‘touching’ the Indian tip (Vanathurai in Kanyakumari district to be precise) progressively ebbs as you drive the last five hundred metres. Infested by touts, hawkers, illegal make-shift stalls and graffiti, the place is anything but a tourist’s delight. What stands out in the cacophony of hawkers and turbulence (as the seas and oceans meet) is the stone-carved statue of Swami Vivekananda, the eminent philosopher and spiritual teacher who swam the 500 metres to the rock and meditated seeking enlightenment.
Menu Manners
In Nagercoil, we got a taste of the food, same same but a bit different. Our banana leaf plate was heaped with ‘Gopi Manjurian’, (a favourite, Gobi Manchurian), ‘masala puppet’ (masala papad), ‘chennai masale’ (chana masala). Food to die for.
Senior journalist Shishir Joshi is co-founder of Mumbai-based Journalism Mentor; E-mail your diarist: shishirj AT journalism.org.in
