Coimbatore Wet Grinders and Accessories Manufacturers Association has sought the district administration’s help in getting a Madras High Court stay on quarrying stones in Uttukuli vacated.
In a petition submitted at the weekly grievances meeting here on Monday, the association said that following a case filed in 2017, the court had, in June this year, stayed the quarrying in Uttukuli, from where stones for crushers, m-sand manufacturers and wet grinders were mined.
Unlike quarries for crushers and m-sand, those for grinder stones were not deep mined. Besides, stones for grinders could not be mined elsewhere, the association said.
The stay would throw out of business around 5,000 families in 11 villages,, who were involved in mining stone for grinders.
The stay would also hit wet grinder manufacturers, the association said, and pointed out that wet grinder manufacturing was the first cluster development programme selected by the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation. And, the wet grinders manufactured in and around Coimbatore had the Geographical Indications Registry tag.
By intervening to get the stay vacated, the administration would help the 30,000 families that were dependent on the wet grinder business, the association said, and also sought amendments to the Tamil Nadu Minor Mineral Concession Rules, 1959.
The State Government should amend the Rules in such a way that those who owned even less than an acre of land could also mine the stones.
The association also assured the administration that manufacturers were ready to bear the compounding charges the Government would levy on mining the grinding stones.
