Sand quarrying banned

By Our Staff Reporter

PATHANAMTHITTA, FEB. 16. The District Collector, Mr. S. Sukumaran, who is also the District Magistrate, has banned quarrying of sand from all rivers in the territorial jurisdiction of the district till the disposal of the case pending before the Kerala High Court, on February 27.

An official press note issued here on Thursday said that the sand quarrying issue was discussed at a meeting of all the grama panchayat presidents in the district convened by the Collector here on Thursday as recommended by the High Court.

The meeting decided to seize all vehicles transporting river sand from the district during the ban period, violating the prohibitory order.

There were allegations at the meeting over the issue of bogus P- Form passes in various panchayat limits and Vigilance cells have been constituted at the district and taluk levels for enforcement of the ban order.

The Tiruvalla RDO, Mr. P.G. Thomas, is the chairman of the district-level vigilance cell. Two DySPs, the District Geologist, the Deputy Director of Panchayats and an engineer with the Major Irrigation Department would be the other members of the district- level vigilance cell.

The taluk-level vigilance cell will be headed by the respective Tahsildar and the cells will submit their reports to the Collector on a daily basis.

One of the important clarifications sought by the Court was to see whether the panchayats were promptly remitting the royalty amount to the Government for sand removal from the river stretches in their jurisdiction.

The State Government directly wields control over the river Pampa and it is the respective Tahsildar who has to accord sanction for sand quarrying. However, sand quarrying from the rivers Achenkoil and Manimala is directly controlled by the respective panchayats.

The Collector said that the Pampa flows through 14 grama panchayat limits in the district. However, the Centre for Earth Science Studies (CESS) has prepared a study report on the sand deposit in the river only for seven grama panchayats. He said that about 24 cases in connection with sand quarrying were pending before the High Court.

The meeting also decided to form separate regulations for sand quarrying from the Pampa, Manimala and Achenkoil rivers. The P- Form pass for quarrying should be signed by the respective Tahsildar and the District Geologist.

The Collector said so far no permission had been given for sand quarrying from the Pampa.

However, there were allegations that the illegal quarrying of river sand was rampant along many stretches of the Pampa.

The SP, Mr. D. Vijayan, the ADM, Mr. A. Gopalakrishnan Nair, the Adoor Sub-Collector, Mr. A.J. Rajan, and the Tiruvala RDO, Mr. P.G. Thomas, also attended Thursday's meeting.

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