Sand lorry owners to go ahead with strike

Sand transportation across the State is expected to be hit from Saturday as lorry owners have reiterated their plan to go ahead with a strike from Friday midnight.

They claimed that the government’s sand policy only dealt with sand extraction and not transportation. About 15,000 lorry owners are likely to participate in the strike.

Federation of Karnataka State Lorry Owners Associations B. Channa Reddy told presspersons here on Friday that the operators were left with no choice but to go on a strike.

“In a situation where thousands of rupees are levied as fine on each transporter, it is difficult to transport sand legally,” Mr. Reddy said. He termed the restriction on sand movement between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. “ridiculous.”

Meanwhile, Federation of Karnataka State Lorry Owners and Agents Association president G.R. Shanmugappa said the sand policy had been framed to foster illegal sand transportation to Kerala and Goa.

“While Bangalore requires about 3,000 loads of sand every month, only about 300 permits are issued by the government. This huge gap is filled through illegal movement of sand,” he alleged.

Mr. Shanmugappa said during the tenure of S.M. Krishna and H.D. Kumaraswamy as chief ministers, sufficient permits were issued to transporters.

The federation demanded that the sand policy ensure legal transportation of sand and permits be issued in commensurate with the requirement of sand.