Madurai: The Madurai bench of the Madras High Court on Tuesday refused to pass an interim order vacating the stay of its single judge order banning sand mining in Tamil Nadu.
Justice R Mahadevan ordered the state government to stop all sand quarrying/ mining activities within six months from today, and had directed that no sand quarries should be opened. Instead the court advised the government to import sand to meet the requirements of the people.
Challenging this, Thoothukudi collector N Venkatesh filed an appeal before the division bench comprising Justices Kalyanasundaram and Krishnavalli stating that the court went beyond the scope of the writ petition and issued various directions, including cessation of all sand mining within six months.
The single judge passed the order on a writ petition filed by MRM Ramaiya, managing director of the company, who challenged the state government action preventing him from transporting the silica sands (imported from Malaysia) from New Harbour stockyard at Thoothukudi port, to the customers even after he provided proper invoice, bill of entry along with proof of GST on import within the state etc.
"The directions issued by the Court were in the nature of a legislative direction and the Court had issued these directions without providing any opportunity to the appellants on these issues and also the concerned lessees of the mines/quarries," said the collector, adding, the directions issued were in the nature of the public interest litigation which was under the preview of the division bench. Hence, in all aspects, the orders of the writ Court are not sustainable and liable to be set aside, he said.
The collector also claimed that the order has been uploaded only in the High court website and they have not yet received it. Hence it is just and necessary that filing original copy of the order passed by this court is dispensed with.
After recording the submission, the court posted the case for hearing on December 8.
