Shareholders and politicians on Thursday urged the nation's top utilities to exit nuclear power as the central government moves to restart reactors idled by public safety fears in the wake of the triple core meltdown in Fukushima Prefecture in 2011.

Despite a number of antinuclear proposals pushed at the shareholders' meetings, however, officials from the utilities said this week they were eager to restart nuclear power plants as soon as possible after their businesses were staggered by the halt of all commercial nuclear reactors in the country after 3/11.

Nine utilities with nuclear plants, including the biggest, Tokyo Electric Power Co., which manages the meltdown-hit Fukushima No. 1 power station — held their general shareholders' meetings at a time when a nuclear power plant in the southwest is preparing go back online this summer for the first time under tighter post-Fukushima safety requirements.