--- On Sun, 1/3/09, Ravinder Singh <[email protected]>
> Date: Sunday, 1 March, 2009, 3:02 PM
> Open
> Letter to Shashi Tharoor & His Reply
>
>
> Dear Mr. Shashi Tharoor,
> I
> am glad you have cared to reply to Vishwanathan’s letter.
> We seldom get a reply to our complaints to political
> leaders, even president and PM ignore
> complaints.
>
> 11,000 children were reported missing in last 12
> month from national capital. Parents of missing children
> have repeated petitions but Delhi Police refuses to even
> write an FIR. Our mediocre leaders don’t have skills to
> deal even most basic complaints firstly don’t command
> necessary authority and secondly can’t implement any
> project or program economically and without corruption.
>
>
> Trivial issues are made interstate disputes and
> small incidents made in to international conflict. Not just
> that they take pride in their stupidity.
>
>
> In
> eight months ending Nov2008 NRIs remitted $39b, contribution
> of NRI from Kerala could be $10b but in the absence of
> suitable Industrial Promotion very little get invested on
> job creating industries. Punjab also has similar situation.
>
>
> Tube-well of my 12 acre farm in Punjab that receive
> one fourth rains than Plachimada Coca Cola plant and deliver
> 25 liters per second yield or 90,000 liters per hour. Coca
> Cola plant drawing 6 LPH water from 35 acre plot can’t be
> blamed for drying up entire areas around it.. Water
> requirement of Coca Cola is 500M3 per day or 0.182million
> cubic meter per year. Water resource development in Kerala
> is 47% as per DGWB2004 Report. Palaghat District has highest
> ground water availability at 0.75BCM out of 6.23BCM for
> Kerala and 0.396 BCM is available for future development.
> Ground water extraction in Kerala is 2.92 BCM out of 6.84
> BCM available.
>
> With 120 to 140 rainy days and 3107mm rainfall over
> 38893 square kilometer area means Kerala get 120 BCM of
> precipitation. So ground water extraction is just 2.5% of
> precipitation.
>
> Google picture shows three dams close to Coca Cola
> Plant and a river also flows less than a kilometer from
> site. One of the dams might be intercepting waters and
> channeling it for irrigation and other purposes. Even dams
> are around same elevation so water flows in to dams but can
> not flow to Coca Cola site unless pumped and nearby river
> flows 40 feet below. Elevation at the site is 560 feet this
> also indicates Coca Cola site is located at the foothills of
> Western Ghats . Generally ground and surface water runs
> downstream fast around foothills or in other words have low
> holding capacity.. As an Inventor & Engineer my guess is
> that Coca Cola selected a wrong site and was perhaps misled
> by property dealers.
>
> Allegations like release of Cadmium and Lead by
> Coca Cola is absolute rubbish. It is the complainants who
> are to provide evidence.
>
> “Supreme Court Monitoring Committee on Hazardous
> Waste Coca Cola, as the single most largest extractor of
> ground water extracting at the highest rate, largest
> transporter of water to the outside through softdrinks, a
> non-essential luxury good, contributed the largest to
> the depletion of ground water” is the most stupid comment
> I have read.
>
> Average rate of water extraction (5 lakh liters per
> day) is 20,000 liters per hour or 6 liters per second- a
> quarter of my 5 HP tube-well in my farm. Coca Cola is
> converting water in to soft that is priced Rs.20,000 per
> kiloliter. Amount of water required to produce a kilogram of
> rice worth Rs.20 is 5 kiloliter in Kerala. This means daily
> water extraction by Coca Cola if supplied to Rice farms
> would produce 100 kg of rice per day worth Rs.2000 or annual
> value of Rs.7,30,000.. But rice can’t be grown 365 days in
> a year normally we get only one crop so actual production
> comes to 14,000 kg from 140 days and farmers may be raising
> vegetables or other crops. But retail value of soft drinks
> is around Rs.6 million per day or Rs. 200 crores annually.
>
>
> Soft Drinks are essential in India considering poor
> quality of potable water supply particularly in serving
> guests. My family avoids soft drinks and has water purifier
> but guests prefer soft drinks in summer. By the way cost of
> mineral water in small packing is more than equivalent
> content in large soft drink bottles. A 150ml to 250 ml
> mineral water pack cost Rs.5 and a 2 liter in glass bottle
> cost Rs.40..
>
> Yes
> soft drinks has very high sugar content harmful for
> diabetic, sugar free products are also available but its
> real benefit is in avoiding spread of water borne diseases.
> Millions avoid water borne diseases by consuming soft drinks
> on travel by rail and road every day. 20 million travel in
> trains every day. It is important to mention here Mineral
> Water or bottled water business is booming growing much
> faster than soft drinks and Coke & Pepsi & Parle are
> leading in this business.
>
> Water required to produce 1 kg of rice in Kerala
> produces about 3,000 liters of bottled water retailed for
> Rs. 30,000 when rice is retailed for Rs. 20.
>
>
> Exports of soft drinks by Coca Cola to other states
> priced Rs.20 per liter containing 95% water is good for
> Kerala may be earning Rs.50 crores to Rs.100 crores annually
> but that foolish leaders have stopped besides loss of jobs.
>
>
> I
> have developed inventions for water saving technologies and
> asked Coke & Pepsi for Collaboration at seminars but
> didn’t get any response.
>
> Ravinder Singh
> March01, 2009
>
>
> AN OPEN LETTER FROM SHASHI
> THAROOR
> Posted by:
> "C.K. Vishwanath" [email protected]
> Fri
> Feb 27, 2009 10:44 am (PST)
> --- On Fri,
> 27/2/09, Holly Ellis <hol...@afrasusa. com
> wrote:
>
> From: Holly Ellis <hol...@afrasusa. com
> Subject: To: ck_vishwanath2000@ yahoo.com
> Date: Friday, 27 February, 2009, 9:36 PM
>
> Dear Mr. Vishwanath,
>
> We have noticed that you have posted "An Open Letter
> to Shashi Tharoor" on your website. Would you be kind
> enough to post this reply, in kind?
>
> Thank you, I look forward to your response.
>
> Sincerely, Holly
> Ellis
>
> Holly Ellis Assistant to Dr. Shashi Tharoor
>
> Afras Ventures
> 230 Park Avenue Suite 2525 New York , NY 10169-0005
>
> hol...@afrasusa. com
> Email
>
> ***********
>
> An Open Response to "an Open Letter to Shashi
> Tharoor"
> 26 February 2009
>
> Dear Mr Swaminathan and Mr Ajayan,
>
> Thank you for sending me your letter on February 24. I
> note, however, that for several days prior to your sending
> it to me, you had already released it to the media and in
> various Internet forums. It would appear that your
> communication was therefore not designed to elicit a genuine
> answer from me, but rather to score political points.
> Nonetheless I am doing you the courtesy of taking your
> public charges in good faith and responding to them point by
> point.
>
> You express your "shock and dismay" at my
> membership of the Advisory Board of Yatn, the Coca-Cola
> India Foundation
> and go on to "condemn [my] insensitivity and
> unconcern to align with the criminal Coca-Cola against the
> people of Plachimada." First of all, I should point out
> the difference between the Foundation and the company. I
> serve, alongside several renowned social activists and human
> rights leaders, under the chairmanship of the former Supreme
> Court Chief Justice and former Chairman of the National
> Human Rights Commission, Justice J. S. Verma, on the
> advisory board of a purely philanthropic organization. The
> Foundation is financed by the Coca-Cola Company as part of
> its corporate social responsibility, which is a practice
> that I have encouraged around the world since my United
> Nations days, when UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan launched
> the "Global Compact" to encourage corporations
> around the world to adhere to certain globally-accepted
> principles and practices. Far from "aligning against
> the people", the purpose of encouraging such a
> Foundation is precisely
> to ensure that the company looks beyond its commercial
> bottom-line and serves the people of our country.
>
> I have been, and remain, strongly committed to the belief
> that in our liberalizing economy, private sector companies
> should not only maintain the highest employment and labour
> standards, but also take pro-active steps to benefit the
> communities in which they operate.. My membership of the
> Foundation's Advisory Board aims at promoting such
> benefits through a number of concrete projects, particularly
> in the area of safe drinking water, which is in such short
> supply in our country.
>
> You level a number of charges against the Coca-Cola
> company's operations at the Plachimada plant, notably
> relating to ground-water exploitation and pollution of
> groundwater through toxic waste from its plant. As I
> stressed, I do not represent the company in any way, but I
> am fully aware that such charges led to the plant ceasing
> operations in 2004. Needless to
> say, far from being "unconcerned", I enquired
> into the matter to satisfy myself that these allegations had
> been thoroughly examined by the competent authorities. I
> note that a Division Bench of the Kerala High Court ruled,
> in a judgement dated 7 August 2005, that the company was not
> guilty of unfairly exploiting the groundwater, and that
> indeed the groundwater in Plachimada continued to dry up
> after the company ceased operations, leading the Court to
> conclude that other factors, including a shortage of
> rainfall, were to blame. The Court based its conclusions on
> a number of detailed independent expert studies, including
> one that the Court itself had commissioned from the Centre
> for Water Resources Development and Management (CWRDM),
> Kozhikode , which is a part of the Kerala State Council for
> Science, Technology and the Environment. I do not understand
> on what basis you are questioning the Kerala High
> Court's
> conclusions.
>
> On the question of ground-water toxins and toxic sludge, I
> have seen reports from reputed governmental bodies,
> including the Kerala State Pollution Control Board and the
> Central Ground Water Board, New Delhi , refuting your
> charges. Once again, I am unable to understand the
> scientific basis for your continued charges against the
> company, and can only conclude that they are politically-
> motivated.
>
> Finally, with regard to the discontinuation of the supply
> of drinking water by the company, I note that this supply in
> fact continued till December 2007, almost four years after
> the plant's forced closure, but that it was not
> practical for the company to continue beyond that date in
> view of its lack of operations in the area. The Court order
> required it to supply drinking water to the community only
> so long as it continued operations there. Nonetheless, the
> Yatn Foundation
> intends to give thought to developing a philanthropic
> project in Kerala in the area of drinking water, an issue to
> which I have personally attached the highest importance in
> my interventions on the Advisory Board.
>
> Let me add, in conclusion, and with a heavy heart, how much
> I deplore both the content and tone of your letter. Since
> leaving the United Nations, I have been doing my best to
> promote investment into Kerala, which alone can generate the
> employment that is so desperately needed by our people. As a
> Keralite, I am ashamed that our people have to find work
> elsewhere in India and in the Gulf because the
> over-politicized atmosphere in Kerala discourages companies
> from investing in our state. The only result of your
> agitation over the Plachimada plant has been to close down
> an investment worth over Rs 80 crores in our state, which
> provided direct employment to
> 400 people and indirect employment to more than 5000
> persons, including transporters, construction workers, and
> distributors. While all these people are now out of a job,
> no one has benefited from your continued protests. Instead,
> the image of Kerala as a place in which it is unwise for
> businesses to invest has been reinforced.
>
> It is tragic that actions such as yours ensure that
> politics overrides the genuine needs of the people. If you
> are truly concerned about the well-being of the people of
> Plachimada, I would urge you instead to attempt to do what
> you can to persuade businesses like Coca-Cola to invest in
> Kerala and provide employment and drinking water to the
> people of our state. I would be pleased to join you in such
> an endeavour.
>
> And instead of being dismayed by my service in such a
> Foundation, I urge you to applaud whatever help the other
> Advisory Board members and I can provide to steer the
> Foundation's resources towards helping
> people on issues like safe drinking water, energy
> resources, waste management, and the development of backward
> areas.
>
> Yours sincerely,
> Shashi Tharoor
>
> 14 February 2009
>
>
>
> An Open Letter to
> Shashi Tharoor,
>
>
> You are aware that
> Coca Cola plant at Plachimada, Palakkad in your native State
> of Kerala has been shut down since 2004 as they failed to
> get the requisite licenses from the Kerala Pollution Control
> Board and the Perumatty Panchayat.
>
> The primary
> reasons for this are:
>
> Coca Cola polluted
> the ground water with deadly toxic and carcinogenic cadmium
> and lead which Coca Cola does not list under raw materials
> and refuse to provide an explanation for their presence Coca
> Cola distributed and spread around these deadly toxic and
> carcinogenic cadmium and lead through their waste sludge and
> slurry under the guise that these are good soil nutrients
> Coca Cola did not supply piped water to the affected
> families as ordered by the Supreme Court Monitoring
> Committee on Hazardous Waste Coca Cola, as the single most
> largest extractor of ground water extracting at the highest
> rate, largest transporter of water to the outside through
> softdrinks, a non-essential luxury good, contributed
> the largest to the depletion of ground
> water
>
>
> The anti Coca Cola
> struggle launched in 2002 in Plachimada by primarily the
> Adivasis and Dalits, is the longest popular struggle in the
> history of Kerala supported by the widest sections of the
> people of Kerala and of all political hues.
>
>
> You may be aware
> that protests have been going on elsewhere in the country
> against many other Coca Cola plants as in Mehdi Ganj and
> Kala Dera for similar destruction of environment, water and
> livelihoods. You may also be aware about the allegations
> against Coca Cola for getting its own workers assassinated
> in Columbia through the drug mafia which was to be enquired
> into by ILO. Coca Cola products were also indicted by Centre
> for Science & Environment, New Delhi , for producing and
> selling bottled water and softdrinks with pesticide and
> other contaminants. Latest in the series is the $7.59
> million penalty that Coca Cola agreed to pay in February
> 2009 to the City of American Canyon in Napa
> County , USA , for violations in wastewater treatment
> permit since 2005 till May 2008 that resulted in high
> concentrations of contaminants that interfered with the
> City's wastewater treatment process and posed an
> environmental hazard.
>
>
> A former
> Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, author,
> writer-columnist and an advisor to several institutions and
> reportedly nurturing political ambition, it is with shock
> and dismay that we, in your native Kerala, have to see you
> as a Member of the Advisory Board of Coca-Cola India
> Foundation. We condemn your insensitivity and unconcern to
> align with the criminal Coca-Cola against the people of
> PLACHIMADA..
>
> VELUR
> SWAMINATHAN. SECRETARY
> Plachimada Adivasis Samrakshana Sangham
> And
> R.AJAYAN.CONVENER
> Plachimada Samara
> Aikyadhardya Samithy
>
>
>
> R.Ajayan
> Convener
> Plachimada Solidarity Committee
> Ph:- Res 0471-2730464
> Mob- 09847142513
> Res Add - Neerajam,
> Kudappanakunnu,
> Trivandrum-695043
> Kerala , India
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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