As part of the investigation into allegations of serious irregularities in mining and sale of river sand in Tamil Nadu, the Directorate of Enforcement (ED) has sought details of illegal sand mining cases registered in the State.
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The Central agency, which conducted surprise checks at multiple sand quarry sites and stockyards on September 12 this year and seized CCTV data storage devices, computer hard discs and incriminating documents including fake receipts and counterfeit QR codes, has written to the Water Resources Department that controls and supervises sand mining and sale, official sources said on Wednesday.
The ED has also sought a complete list of contractors for 25 sand quarries, along with their PAN and bank account details. It called for a complete sale register, as per online sales, giving the names of customers, credentials, date of payments made to the contractor per cubic metre, volume of sand mined and transported by private players to sand depots or stockyards, total number of lorry trips and invoices raised month-wise, among others, the sources added.
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Acting on the ED’s request, A. Muthaiya, engineer-in-chief and chief engineer general, Water Resources Department, has written to Collectors of 13 districts to send complaints and First Information Reports (FIRs) registered in their respective jurisdictions from January 1, 2022 to September 12, 2023 to the Executive Engineers of Mining & Monitoring Division for onward submission to the investigating agency, the sources said.
Senior officials were instructed to coordinate with the Collectors/Superintendents of Police and gather the information sought by the investigators at the earliest, the sources said, adding that senior officials of the ED, accompanied by experts from other agencies, had inspected the sand mining sites and stockyards in the last three days.
According to the sources, several cases had been registered in many districts on illegal sand mining and in most of them, the complaints were lodged by Assistant Director, Mines or Village Administrative Officers.
The issue of illegal sand mining hit the headlines when Lourdhu Francis, VAO of Morappanadu in Thoothukudi district, was hacked to death in his office by two suspects against whom he had lodged a complaint with the local police of illegal sand mining from the Tamiraparani riverbed. The two persons were sentenced to life imprisonment by a court recently.
The ED is probing a money laundering angle in the backdrop of allegations that a large quantity of sand was sold illegally by issuing fake receipts to sand lorry operators in the recent months, thereby causing a huge revenue loss to the Central and State governments.