For nearly six months, the Kerala stone and sand mafia, backbone of the State’s powerful construction lobby, have exerted all their might to silence V Jaseera, a feisty housewife and mother of three, who has taken her fight to protect the coastline from illegal sand mining in Kannur district to the State capital, and since August, to the national capital. According to environmental activists, the State Revenue Minister Adoor Prakash supports the stone quarrying mafia, while the sand mafia is close to Congress’ Kannur MP, K Sudhakaran.
India’s leading ecologist, Dr S Faizi, a key negotiator at the Intergovernmental Negotiation Committee on the Convention for Bio Diversity and a Board member of the CBD Alliance, has publicly supported Jaseera’s demand for implementation of the National Green Tribunal order banning beach sand mining in the State. Condemning the “ludicrous allegations” being made against Jaseera (of having underworld links) as unfair, Faizi points out that after 64 days of satyagraha in front of the State Secretariat, where public support in favour of coastal protection swelled but was ignored by the callous regime, she took her agitation and three children to the capital’s Jantar Mantar.
In a strong letter to Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, Faizi said it was a matter of deep concern that the police was constantly “intimidating Jazeera who is on a peaceful satyagraha mission in front of the Secretariat to protect the fragile coastline of Kerala, particularly her village, from the sea sand mining mafia.” This, he pointed out, was happening despite the National Green Tribunal ordering a nationwide ban on all significant sand mining projects without environmental clearance. The statutory bodies responsible for protecting the sea coast, particularly the Coastal Zone Management Authority, have failed abysmally in performing their duty, leading to an irreversible destruction of Kerala’s coast, Faizi lamented.
Jaseera, 31, a resident of Puthiyangadi village, Madayi gram panchayat, Kannur, began a sit-in protest in June before a police station near her village, accompanied by her two school going daughters and infant son. The district administration tried to contain matters by setting up a police chowki in the area to maintain records to show that all was well. Seeing the futility of the action, she shifted her protest to the State Head headquarters nine days later. At first, the Chief Minister’s public contact program ignored her completely.
The crux of the matter pertains to the construction lobby which is on a building spree, raising new apartment blocks, flats and big houses and buildings close to the coast. Facing shortage of river sand, they began mining sand from the sea coast in huge quantities (free of cost, or in other words, theft of a State resource), in the process denuding and degrading the coastline completely. Deep pits have appeared on the coast, endangering the seawall, and accentuating erosion from the sea.
Environmentalists say that such rampant and illegal sand mining is taking place in many places along the 500-kilometre coastline. Jaseera physically resisted Tipper Lorries carrying the sand from the beach, taking photographs of those engaged in sand mining and complaining to the police, which was forced to take action. She suffered untold abuse, threats, physical intimidation, including the ill-will of locals who were employed as labour to do the illegal sand mining.
In early August, after 64 days of protest, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy called Jaseera to his chamber and gave numerous verbal assurances about stopping the illegal mining, but refused to give the same in writing. This prompted her to move her protest to Delhi. For Jaseera, the inability of the authorities to check the illegal mining was proof that the sand miners were supported by the police and other authority figures.
Revenue Minister Adoor Prakash openly accused Jaseera of being sponsored by ‘unknown terrorist organisations’ and claimed, “We have already accepted her demands. A police picket has been put up near her village in Madayi besides round-the-clock police patrolling to check sand mining in the area. Even the local panchayats have passed resolutions to create awareness against sand mining.” In reality, say environmentalists, the police chowki is for show only and the mining continues unchecked.
Meanwhile, the National Human Rights Commission had taken suo motu note of allegations of illegal sand mining along the Kerala coast. Union Minister for Rural Development, Jairam Ramesh, has written to the Chief Minister that Jaseera’s fight against the sand mafia has “merit”. He urged a “fair inquiry by an independent and credible authority”. It is pertinent that in November 2012, Kannur MP K Sudhakaran was caught on camera trying to force the release of a man held for sand mining from a police station in the district. K Ragesh, a Congress youth leader, had reportedly come to the station to demand the release of a truck confiscated for alleged sand smuggling. This is surely evidence, if any were needed, about the deep nexus between political workers and people involved in the illegal extraction and sale of sand.
Sudhakaran was joined by MLAs KM Shaji (Indian Union Muslim League) and AP Abdullakutty who alleged that the youth leader was brutally assaulted by sub-inspector BK Siju. The police had seized the truck under the Kerala Protection of River Banks and Regulation of Removal of Sand Act, 2001. As of now, the stalemate continues. What has most frustrated the sand mafia with regard to Jaseera’s tenacity is the fact that she has received unstinting support from her husband, a madrasa teacher, who concurs with her contention that every citizen has the right to be concerned about the environment and to take a stand to protect it.
Niticentral.com, 5 November 2013
http://www.niticentral.com/2013/11/05/kerala-sand-mafia-hounds-activist-jaseera-154397.html