Chennai: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on Friday urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to cancel the award of Tungsten Mining rights in Madurai District and instruct the Ministry of Mines to desist from floating any bids for mining without the consent of the concerned State Government.
In a Demi-Official letter to Mr Modi, the Chief Minister drew his attention to the grim situation in Madurai district due to the Union Government’s award of tungsten mining rights and requested his immediate intervention to cancel it.
“We had already raised our concerns on such auctioning of mining rights of critical and strategic minerals, through the letter dated October 3, 2023, from TN Minister for Water Resources and Natural Resources”, he said.
But unfortunately, the Union Minister of Parliamentary affairs, Coal and Mines in his letter dated November 2, 2023 had rejected them, mentioning that the auction of critical minerals by Ministry of Mines cannot be withheld, in the larger interests of the country.
Meanwhile, the Union Ministry of Mines has declared Hindustan Zinc Limited as the preferred bidder of Nayakkarpatti Tungsten block (Critical and Strategic Mineral) under Tranche IV on November 7, 2024.
This Tungsten Block comprises of Kavattayampatty, Ettimangalam, A.Vallalapatty, Arittapatty, Kidaripatty and Narasingampatty villages, Mr Stalin said.
Among them, Arittapatti is a notified Bio-Diversity Heritage site and is famous for archaeological monuments including cave temples, sculptures, Jain symbols, Tamil
Brahmi Scripts and Pancha Pandavar stone beds, he pointed out.
Observing that any mining activity will cause irreparable damage to these sites, the
Chief Minister said in addition, commercial mining in such densely populated villages
will definitely affect the people in these villages.
This has caused immense anguish to the people, who fear that their livelihood may be
lost forever.
Hence, the Government of Tamil Nadu would never allow any such mining to be undertaken
in these areas, he asserted.
“Considering the above situation, I urge you to instruct the Ministry of Mines to cancel
the award of tungsten mining rights given to Hindustan Zinc Limited in Madurai District.
I also request you to instruct the Ministry of Mines to desist from floating any bids for
mining without the consent of the concerned State Government”, he added.
