Revive agricultural lands lost due to granite quarrying: Farmers

MADURAI: Farmers in Madurai district have urged the administration to revive the agricultural lands in Melur that were lost due to illegal granite quarrying. They also charged that the illicit quarrying of blue metals is still going on in the area.
N Palanisamy, president of Tamil Nadu Sugarcane Farmers Association raised the issue during the farmers' grievances meeting stating that 40,000 acres of agriculture was lost with irrigation channels and water bodies destroyed due to quarrying."We have been raising the issue of reviving agriculture in these lands and the cost of recovery should be collected from the quarry operators," he stressed. Palanisamy also charged that the blue metal quarry operators still operating in the region are quarrying beyond the permitted area and sought action against them.
District collector, L Subramanian sought an explanation from the mines department officials about this illegal quarrying to which the officials gave elusive answers such as the revenue department was asked to survey the area. Irked by this, Subramanian chided the officials and demanded a report on blue metal quarries within 15 days. Commenting on the action taken against illegal granite quarrying that rocked the district last year, Subramanian said the administration is waiting for the evaluation report from the expert team. "The mined granite blocks have to be valued before auction and once the report is ready, the auctioning of the blocks can start," he said. But Palanisamy pointed out that the granite stone blocks will lose their quality and value if they are left under the open sky for long.
The farmers also urged the district administration to take measures to announce the district as drought-hit and start distributing compensation. The farmers complained that the land tax is collected from them though agriculture has come to a standstill due to drought. The collector said that the administration has been working on it.
Joint director of agriculture, Jayasingh Gnanadurai told the farmers that compensation has been sought for 1.87 lakh coconut trees which perished in the district due to the drought and once the government approves, it would be provided. In the same manner, they estimated that 6,000 hectares of agriculture hit by the drought and report has been submitted to the government.