The Tamil Nadu government on Monday told the Madras High Court that it had partially complied with an order passed by the court on October 9 to install closed circuit television (CCTV) cameras at district and State borders to keep a check on the transport of illegally mined minerals.
Appearing before a Division Bench of Justices T.S. Sivagnanam and G. Jayachandran, State Government Pleader (SGP) V. Jayaprakash Narayanan said the government required two more months to complete the installation of the CCTVs at all checkposts.
Asking the SGP to put his submissions in writing by November 20, the judges suggested that the government could go for solar-operated cameras and ensure that the movement of minerals within the State and outside was monitored round the clock without being dependant on electricity.
The suggestion was made during the hearing of a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed by activist ‘Traffic’ K.R. Ramaswamy in 2014 and has been pending since then. The activist had moved the court seeking a direction to the government to consider his representations and curb illegal mining across the State.
Passing interim orders in this case on September 11, 2014, the then Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul (now a Supreme Court judge) and Justice M. Sathyanarayanan had appointed IAS officer U. Sagayam as a Legal Commissioner to inspect the granite quarries in Madurai district and submit a report to the court on the extent of illegal mining.
Though Mr. Sagayam filed a detailed report and was thereafter discharged from the responsibility given to him by the court, the case remained pending and got listed before Division Benches until the incumbent Chief Justice Amreshwar Pratap Sahi constituted a Special Bench led by Justice Sivagnanam to hear the case.
During the last hearing of the case on October 9, the Bench ordered the installation of CCTV cameras in checkposts. They felt that the measure might bring down illegal mining and transportation of the minerals to a large extent.
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