A number of social impacts have been outlined by the eminent fact-finding mission which visited Mundra in April and May 2012, reported in the Real Cost of Power.

• Adequate, meaningful, and informed consultations with the affected communities were not conducted. The communities repeatedly complained about the lack of consultation before the project started and failure to share key information about the impacts and mitigation plans. 

• The project has caused drastic reduction in fish catches, destroying the livelihoods of local fisher-folk. Available fish-catch data indicate considerable reduction in fish catch in the past three years since the adjacent Adani plant was commissioned, which has been exacerbated by the partial commissioning of Tata Mundra. Communities fear total loss of aquatic wealth when the project is fully operational, along with their livelihoods as fisher-folk.

• The project blocked access to fishing and grazing grounds. Access roads for local fisher-folk and pastoralists to fishing and grazing grounds have either been blocked or diverted, forcing villagers to take an unusually long route and pay more for their transport, and resulting in considerable delay for women returning from the markets after selling fish.

• The project failed to thoroughly examine or adequately address the health and environmental impacts of ash contamination. The partially-operational plant is already contaminating drying fish, salt, and animal fodder in the area, causing significant health concerns. Salt contamination has been demonstrated to cause an increase of diseases and abnormal abortions in cattle. Further, heavy metals contained in toxic coal ash such as cadmium, lead, selenium, and mercury are known to bio-accumulate in animal and human bodies.
• CGPL forced a massive financial burden on its consumers. In 2014 CGPL petitioned the CERC, the government regulator, to be compensated for the increase in imported fuel price, allowing them to increase their tariffs by 27%. This has the potential to have a cascading effect on consumers in India if other power plants follow suit.
• Insufficient social baseline data for E&S assessments according to IFC policies.Therefore the risk and impact of the project on the local fisher people could not be determined correctly. People have been displaced both in physical terms and in economic terms due to improper application of land acquisition policies.

Environmental impacts were also outlined by the fact-finding mission and reported in 2012 by BIC in the Real Cost of Power.

• Massive contribution to global warming: The total greenhouse gases emission from the Tata Mundra plant, based on Ernst and Young's estimated baseline CO emissions for the project, would be 30.796 million tonnes per year (baseline value), which would make it India's third largest emitter of greenhouse gases. This would significantly increase the atmospheric carbon load, and put further pressure on already vulnerable communities.

• The project violated its environmental clearance by destroying inland ecosystems. Large stretches of mangroves, dry-land forests, and biodiversity-rich creeks were destroyed for the construction of the inlet and outfall channels and other associated activities of the project. The team could not find the required forest clearance for this destruction, which the company refuses to own up to.

• The company was not required to conduct and/or disclose chemical pollution studies. The IFC and ADB failed to require the company to conduct and/or disclose chemical pollution studies. This harm warrants further, in-depth investigation.

• The project violated its environmental clearance by adopting a one-through cooling system. The project was permitted for a closed-cycle cooling system, but installed a cheaper, more environmentally-destructive one-through cooling system.

• The project ignored the potential impacts of radioactivity from the coal ash pond. Independent readings taken as far as 400 meters away from the ash pond recorded radiation levels that were double those found in the villages. While this reading is about half the permissible limit, the project is only one-fifth operational, with four more units planned. None of the impact assessments have addressed this.

• Insufficient attention was given to local fishworkers. The local fishworkers are from a religious minority and occupy a marginal position in society given their migrant traditions. The impact of the project was not adequately considered during the E&S assessments of this project.

Women's safety, security and free access to their livelihood sources have been obstructed. Communities constantly complain about the presence of a large migrant labour force being a cause of women's safety concerns.

In fishing families, women work alongside men, in sorting, drying, and often taking the products to the market. Thus, free and safe access for women to all these areas is a precondition to their daily life and enterprise. In several fishing settlements around the Tata Mundra plant, the issue of local women not being allowed to enter some areas was reported to the fact-finding team by these women themselves.

The name of Tata's/CGPL's Korean Colony came up on a number of occasions, as a place unsafe for women and where incidents might have happened. Since the Tata Mundra UMPP is using many Korean-supplied machinery, there is a settlement of Korean workers. Some men also raised the issue of the presence of a large migrant labour force being a cause of concern for these women's safety. Instead of taking corrective measure in this regard, the company has decided to ban local women from entering some areas.

• The Environmental and Social Impact Assessments filed by the company were deficient. The company failed to account for significant social, economic, and environmental damages caused by the project in its EIA and SIA. It even neglected to identify certain communities as project affected. For example, the EIA states that the project covers 1,254 hectares of "vacant land", whereas in fact the area has a high rural population density, and the land has supported multiple rural economic activities, fishing, fish-drying, animal-grazing being the main ones, for many decades. It is highly ecologically sensitive. The impact assessments were not carried out independently, but by a Tata-owned venture, TCE Consulting Engineers, impacting their credibility substantially.

• The IFC and ADB failed to require the company to conduct a cumulative impact study. The project, sited in the vicinity of several other large-scale polluting industries, will have significant cumulative impacts on the local population and environment, yet no cumulative impact assessment has been performed.
• The IFC has failed to respond to CAO findings. In response to the weak IFC response to the CAO findings, human rights and environmental activists from over 28 countries have come together to sent an open letter to President Kim, urging him to immediately withdraw from the project. In April 2014 MASS has handed over an additional 24,000 signatures to the executive directors of the World Bank.  

 The impacts noted above by the fact-finding team were found at a time when only one unit of the 4,000 megawatts plant was operational. Now that all units of the project are on stream, the impacts are manifold, and according to a follow-up report by a member of the fact-finding team, are not being monitored by either the Tata or the Government. For example, an increase of 20% of severe respiratory diseases among children in the villages near to the Mundra plant has been reported by a local doctor. Coal dust and fly ash is putting the lives of people and that of animals and horticulture at risk.