Residents of Koogur near Lalgudi on Friday came out strongly against the move to open a new sand quarry on the Coleroon river at their village.
A large number of residents of the village walked into the farmers grievances meeting that was being held at the Collector’s Office and expressed their strong disapproval to the preliminary work of laying an approach road to the proposed quarry.
In a petition presented to K.Tharpagaraj, District Revenue Officer, who was chairing the meeting, the villagers said that sand mining from the river would severely affect agriculture operations in their village as the groundwater table is bound to go down. Besides, it could affect the structure of Grand Anicut, situated in the vicinity. The district administration should immediately order stoppage of the work to allay apprehensions of farmers. They contended that the laying of the road using blue metal and rocks across the river was in violation of a 2012 High Court order.
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P. Anbazhagan, one of the villagers, said that the groundwater table has gone down in and around Koogur owing to sand mining from the Coleroon. Further mining, especially at their village, would affect agriculture badly. Ashok Raja of the village said that the sand mining could lead to breaches at times of flood.