STATEMENT OF DR.SUBRAMANIAN SWAMY

I demand the sacking of the Chairman of the Sethusamudram Canal Project, Mr. Reghupathy for speaking a blant lie at press conference on July 27th, wherein he claimed that the NASA had communicated to him that the Rama Setu, called by toadies of British Imperialists as "Adam's Bridge", is a natural formation, and hence debunking the Hindu belief that it was built on the direction of Bhagwan Sri Rama.

In response to my e-mail query, the NASA has replied that it made no such communication[e-mails enclosed]. The agency has clarified to me that "We therefore cannot speculate on the validity, or invalidity, of other origin narratives for the Palk Strait islands", thus denying the claim of the Chairman of the SSCP. The NASA also censures those who "interpret our response[meaning the Chairman of SSCP] as a scientifically rigorous conclusion as to the nature of the Palk Strait islands is both a misrepresentation and misreporting, and is inappropriate considering the limitations of our data."

This Friday, I am flying to Houston to meet NASA officials at their headquarters. Thereafter upon returning to India, I shall file a contempt of court case against the Union Shipping Minister in the Supreme Court. My PIL on which Notices have been issued to the Union Government to file affidavits on why the Rama Setu should not be protected by re-alignment of the canal dredging, and also be declared an Ancient Monument within meeting the law, is to be heard by the Chief Justice's Bench in the Supreme Court on August 13th

Text of the E-mail Reply From NASA

Thank you for contacting us regarding this issue. Earthweb is a service provided by the Image Science & Analysis Laboratory at the NASA Johnson Space Center.

Our response to inquiries regarding Adam's Bridge is based solely on the information captured in the astronaut photography dataset. Astronaut photography does not provide information on the age of islands in the Palk Strait, nor can it provide information on the subsurface structure or composition of the islands. We therefore cannot speculate on the validity , or invalidity, of other origin narratives for the Palk Strait islands.

Chains of islands typically form from a variety of natural geological processes and their occurrence, by themselves, is not evidence of any human activity. We offer no conclusion regarding the ultimate origin of the Palk Strait islands in the response that has been widely quoted, we simply state that island chains form by natural processes. Modern geological thought regarding island chains around the world suggests that this statement is valid.

To interpret our response as a scientifically rigorous conclusion as to the nature of the Palk Strait islands is both a misinterpretation and misreporting, and is inappropriate considering the limitations of our data . To reach any such conclusion, detailed surface and subsurface geological and perhaps, anthropological information for the islands would need to be collected, analyzed, and published.

Thank you for your interest in astronaut photography of Earth!

Earthweb
The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth
NASA Johnson Space Center
http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov