NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday declined to give any direction to the government on the appointment of an independent regulatory body to oversee nuclear plants across the country.A Bench comprising Chief Justice S H Kapadia, Justice A K Patnaik and Justice Swatanter Kumar said that the court cannot convert itself into Parliament.The Bench, however, kept the issue open by asking the petitioners to come out with a solution on nuclear safety through a public debate and assured them that it would look into it. The Bench further said that it was aware of the fact that the matter was important as it concerned Article 21 of the Constitution, but expressed its reservations in looking into the safety aspect of all nuclear plants saying that it did not have necessary expertise.“As far as public safety is concerned, Article 21 is in our mind, which can certainly be argued, but for other aspects we cannot convert this court into Parliament,” the Bench remarked. The Bench directed the petitioners to place before it within four weeks the models adopted by the US, the UK, France, Canada and other such countries on the appointment of regulatory bodies, which are independent of the government to oversee nuclear safety.“You have a public debate and come out with a solution. We will look into it,” the Bench added. However, when Prashant Bhushan, counsel for the petitioner, an NGO Common Cause, told the Bench that another PIL on Lokpal Bill was also filed, the Bench told him not to mix up things. “Don’t compare this with Lokpal. Lokpal is different,” the Bench told him.At the outset, when the Bench wanted to know if any Bill on the issue was before Parliament, Bhushan said there was one, which, however, was not about independent regulatory body.The PIL sought the court’s direction for halting construction of all proposed nuclear power plants in the country till their proper security assessment was done by an independent body.During the arguments, Bhushan said the people of the country were sitting on a “time bomb” which could explode any moment and referred to an article written by eminent nuclear scientist A Gopalkrishnan, an expert in nuclear safety, who, in the past chaired the convention on nuclear safety to which India was a signatory. While Bhushan was answering the court’s questions, Attorney General G E Vahanvati said it was for the government to look into the issue of appointment of a regulatory body. When the argument was put forth that the regulator had to be independent of the government, the Bench said most of the scientists in India were government employees. Bhushan referred to the model adopted by the United States for appointment of the regulator.“Why don’t you give us the model,” the Bench said and asked him to place before it within four weeks, the models and posted the hearing after the winter vacation.(With inputs from Agencies)
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