Villagers, farmers take out rally demanding Centre to scrap Tungsten mining project in TN

Madurai (Tamil Nadu), Jan 7 (PTI) Several hundreds of farmers and people from about 40 villages in Madurai's Melur and its neighbourhood took out a massive rally here on Tuesday demanding the Central government to scrap the Tungsten mining project at Nayakkarpatti village.

The nearly 25-km long march from Narasingampatti village on the Tiruchirappalli-Madurai national highway to the Head Post Office at Tallakulam in the city saw the participation of farm workers and women too. The protesters voiced concern over the possible environmental and social impact if Tungsten was mined.

Traders in Melur downed their shutters in support of the protesters.

There were some tense moments when police stopped the protesters from entering the city at Mattuthavani. Later, the police allowed them to resume the rally.

The villagers have been agitating for over a month demanding the Centre to rescind its decision of awarding Tungsten mining to Hindustan Zinc Limited in about 5,000 acres of land spread across ten villages in Melur taluk. The issue even echoed the state Legislative Assembly leading to the House adopting a unanimous resolution in December 2024 asking the Centre to cancel the mining proposal.

Denying a charge of AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami, State Law Minister S Regupathy said police had granted permission to the people to take out the rally.

"Doesn't he (Palaniswami) know that the protest is against the central government? Palaniswami has fabricated a lie that police denied permission for the rally," Regupathi said.

BJP Tamil Nadu chief K Annamalai accused the ruling DMK of enacting a farce on the Tungsten mining project.

"It did not object when the mining contract was awarded but began to oppose it when the public started protesting against the project," Annamalai said in a post on social media platform 'X'. PTI JSP KH