KOCHI | May 22, 2015: The state government on Thursday submitted before the Kerala High Court that allowing mining in areas which were recommended as Ecologically Sensitive Areas (ESAs) would defeat the very purpose of the prohibition order.

The affidavit was filed in response to a petition filed by a quarry owner in Palakkad against the action of the geologist in not allowing quarrying operations on the ground that the mining area was an ESA.

Oommen V Oommen, Chairman of the Kerala State Biodiversity Board, submitted that the permits for quarrying in ESAs could not be renewed without prior environmental clearance. The statutory authorities had been directed to prohibit quarrying and sand mining in the ESAs identified by the Kasthurirangan Committee except cases which had been received by Environment Clearance from State Environment Impact Assessment authority (SEIAA) before putting the committee report on the website on April 17, 2013. In fact, the exact boundaries of the ESAs of the state had not been demarcated. What was uploaded was the maps of ESA villages with the ESAs as finetuned by a local-level committee.

The state submitted that quarrying in ecologically sensitive areas without prior environment clearance would amount to grave contempt of orders of the Supreme Court in the Deepak Kumar’s case.

(Source: http://www.newindianexpress.com/)