The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court ordered notice to the state on a PIL challenging a government order allowing removal of soil/earth from private leased land for domestic and agricultural purposes.
The petitioner submitted that the minerals were illegally picked up and sold for commercial gain on the pretext of the same sub-soil.
Justice S. Vaidyanathan and Justice G. Jayachandran in Virudhunagar district. Ordered the notice on a petition filed by Gunasekaran. He complained that this would cause serious damage and irreparable loss to the agriculturists and sought directions to the authorities to stop the indiscriminate excavation of soil/soil from the private leased land.
He said that the Director of Geology and Mining had sent a proposal to the government to remove or remove soil from the Ryotwadi land for the betterment of agricultural land and a government order was passed. An amendment was brought in the Tamil Nadu Minor Mineral Concession Rules, 1959.
The amendment states that the clearance or removal of soil/soil in Ryotwari land manually for rectification of agricultural land or lands which are not suitable for the purpose of cultivation, to a maximum depth specified by the authorities not exceeding one and a half meters shall not be treated as mining activity. , They said.
The extraction should be done under a permit issued by the District Collector for a period not exceeding three months. But, the norms for declaring the land unfit for cultivation were not notified. He issued the mandate without taking public opinion, he complained.
The petitioner submitted that as a result of this removal of nutrient-rich top soil, surface seepage and infiltration conditions will be greatly reduced, thereby improving the permeability and recharging conditions of groundwater.