The Madras High Court on Monday permitted Anti Methane Project Federation (AMPF) to conduct a conference at Mayiladuthurai in Nagapattinam district to impress upon the Centre as well as the State government the need to ensure protection of natural resources in the State and not venture into projects such as extraction of hydrocarbons.
A Division Bench of Justices T. S. Sivagnanam and V. Bhavani Subbaroyan granted the permission while disposing of a writ appeal preferred by T. Jayaraman, chief coordinator of AMPF, after hearing elaborate arguments advanced by senior counsel R. Vaigai representing him.
The appeal was preferred against the dismissal of a writ petition last year. Issuing a series of directionson the appeal, the judges directed the appellant to provide four possible dates for the conference.when the conference could take place and instructed the police to grant permission for it between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. on any one of those days.
Mr. Jayaraman was ordered to give an undertaking that he would not make any statement against the sovereignty of the country.
Considering the fact that the appellant was a retired professor of history, who had reportedly authored 11 books and 25 research articles, the judges said they expected the petitioner to conduct the conference as a forum to explain the scientific aspects around extraction of hydrocarbons rather than using it as a platform for political outburst.
It was also made clear that the conference should at no cost be used to promote personal interests.
The list of invitees should be submitted in advance to the police who would have the liberty to prune it. However, pruning should be done on the basis of sound reasons involving public interest and not arbitrarily, they said.
In his affidavit, the petitioner claimed that extraction of hydrocarbons from the fertile Cauvery delta would cause great damage to groundwater and agriculture in the region. Therefore, his outfit decided to conduct the conference solely with the intention of highlighting the need to preserve natural resources for posterity, but the police were not inclined to grant permission.
