The small village of Vallikkode at Pramadom panchayat, near here, will witness a novel reading campaign highlighting the ill-effects of indiscriminate granite quarrying.
Gramaraksha Samithi, a people’s action council, is busy preparing for the launch of its month-long environmental awareness campaign on Saturday.
The idea is to make the entire village read the novel Kalpramanam written by Rajeev Sivasankar. The novel depicts the plight of a village that squirms in the clutches of the granite quarry lobby.
Mr. Sivasankaran depicts the sorry state of affairs of a village ‘Pazhukka’ in his book. The samithi leaders identified ‘Pazhukka’ with their own village of Vallikkode where they have launched a mass movement against the indiscriminate granite quarrying on the environmentally-sensitive Thudiyurlippara.
Thudiyurlippara that forms the landmark of Vallikkode is fast disappearing due to the indiscriminate quarrying. Almost half of the hill has already been quarried away and the villagers have been demanding immediate closure of the quarry.
The samithi has collected 50 copies of the novel for supplying to each household for reading during the month-long reading drive, which, they believe would strengthen people’s will to protect the remaining hills and rocks in the village. The villagers had on April 4 staged a sit-in on the road leading to the quarry at Vallikkode, seeking immediate closure of the quarry.
The leaders alleged blatant violation of mining rules as well as the Kerala Land Utilisation Act by the quarry lobby at Thudiyurlippara in collusion with a section of the official machinery. The permit for quarrying expired on March 31. But, the negligence on the part of the panchayat had paved the way for the continuance of quarrying with the help of a Kerala High Court order, they alleged.
