: Construction activities in the district, including civil works of Kochi Metro are all set to resume as the fortnight-long quarry strike has been called off.
This follows marathon talks convened by District Collector M.G. Rajamanickam here on Monday, after a section of small quarry owners refused to call off their agitation despite talks held in the presence of Chief Minister Oommen Chandy. They insisted that they will call off the strike only if the government assured them that their grievances regarding licence renewal and environmental clearance based on the outcome of a stay order pending before High Court of Kerala were addressed.
Mr. Rajamanickam was asked to work out a settlement after talks convened by Mr. Chandy did not yield the desired result. “All quarries that have permit will now resume operations. We told them that further talks can be held only after quarry owners withdrew their agitation and they paid heed to it,” he said.
“As of now, all quarry owners, including big, medium and small-scale ones have decided to withdraw our strike,” said V. Prasad, convenor of the Samara Samiti. Reacting to the development, DMRC sources said that it will take up to one week for civil works (which have to get over by October) to get back to normal. “We need 800 cubic metres of concrete each day. Most migrant labourers returned to their home states for Holi, following the strike and subsequent non-availability of granite chips for concreting. We are awaiting their speedy return for works to pick pace. We had directed our civil contractors to mobilise 800 more workers to speed up works, when the quarry agitation played spoilsport with our plans.”
