Tamil Nadu calls for cancellation of tungsten mining rights

The Tamil Nadu assembly on Monday unanimously adopted a resolution with the support of the BJP state unit urging the Union government to cancel tungsten mining rights given to Vedanta owned Hindustan Zinc Limited in Madurai district.

Chief minister MK Stalin said the DMK-led government will never allow the tungsten. “We won’t grant permission for Tungsten mining in Tamil Nadu. Let me say this categorically. This project won’t come to our state as long as I remain the Chief Minister…if it (the project) comes, I won’t continue in this post,” he told the assembly.

Ruckus erupted in the assembly as leader of opposition and AIADMK general secretary Edappadi Palaniswami (EPS) accused the DMK government for allowing the mining.

EPS said: “The DMK government remained silent when the BJP-led Union government brought an amendment to the Mines and Minerals Act, 1957 and DMK MPs were silent in the Parliament when auctioning of the tungsten mining process went on from February to October.”

Stalin accused EPS-led AIADMK of supporting the Mines Bill in Parliament. “DMK MPs indeed opposed this amendment but the BJP-led union government passed the Bill using its majority in 2023,” he said.

The resolution, was moved by the water resources minister Duraimurugan, stated that such mining will not be allowed without the state’s consent and the Centre disregarded the DMK government’s objection to the auction. “The people of Tamil Nadu and the Government of Tamil Nadu will never accept this step,” it read. “Since this action of the Union Government has created a sense of anxiety among the people living in the area that their livelihood will be permanently affected, they are undertaking several protests against this action.”

Several villages in Melur taluk of Madurai district have been protesting after the Union ministry of mines on November 7 awarded tungsten mining rights in about 5,000 acres in 10 villages that are located close to Arittapatti, Tamil Nadu’s first biodiversity heritage site.

“AIADMK will never allow any project that goes against the interests of the people,” EPS said supporting the resolution.

BJP’s floor leader Nainar Nagendran said there would be “good news” from the Centre on the issue soon. BJP state president K Annamalai said that he had written a letter and spoken over phone to Union mines minister Kishan Reddy to abandon the project and the latter had told him that the Centre would reconsider the project. “Due to wrong and incomplete information by the DMK government, the public are protesting,” Annamalai said.

Stalin had on November 29 written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking his intervention to instruct the ministry of mines to cancel the award of tungsten mining rights given to Hindustan Zinc Limited (HZL) in Madurai District. He also urged Modi to inform the central department to desist from floating any bids for mining without the consent of the concerned state government.

Previously the department had informed the state that the mining auctions cannot be withheld in the interest of the country. Tamil Nadu has neither received any application from HZL a subsidiary of Vedanta, nor has the state granted permission for the company to mine tungsten in about 5,000 acres of land in Madurai district, forest minister K Ponmudy said on November 21.