The Environmentalists: Another View A Comment Navroz Mody IN his article "'The Environmentalists : Another View" (April 12), after presenting his caricatured views of the environmentalists' case, Kannan Sriniva- son proceeds for half the article to Ascribe motives to environmentalists of defending property interests in every one of the issues they have raised, Srinivasan's presentation of the environmentalists' case (for opposing the location of a fertiliser complex at Thal- Vaishet) does not even remotely resemble the case as made out to him, as we shall demonstrate below. More space in his article is devoted to a smear campaign suggesting that the environmentalists are bought off to serve the interests of the rich, even sent on trips abroad, etc. We present below our case, for the reader to judge its 'frivolity' and in fact look forward to a refutation of it from any source. This controversy has been raging for the Past two years; it does seem surprising, that all the journalists, scientists, environmental experts, the Task Force of the Department of Science and Technology, the Maharashtra Prevention of Water Pollution Board (MPWPB), the Planning Commission, Ministry of Finance, MPs, etc, (all of whom have raised at some point objections to various aspects of this project) are, by Kannan Srinivasan's account mi-sled, motivated, and misinformed.
