Taking advantage of lack of surveillance, illegal sand miners have carved out unauthorised access roads to the banks of Chaliyar eyeing the huge deposit of sand formed in the river following the recent landslides in Wayanad and Vilangad in Kozhikode. Residents are complaining that the Revenue department and the police are turning a blind eye to the issue.
“Revenue department officials have not functioned effectively within local body limits in the past six months. Their squads have not responded to public complaints or conducted flash inspections despite frequent alerts,” said K.K. Ali, a resident of Feroke. He also added that local administrators had taken no action to close the access roads constructed for the easy entry of goods vehicles.
Environmental activists from Mavoor panchayat said that custom-made metal boats were being used to facilitate sand mining. Police and Revenue officials had become less active in the region due to attacks on officials who took a firm stance against illegal sand mining, they claimed.
Efforts of local administrators to strengthen night patrols with the support of people’s vigilance committees have also failed. Most of these committees are now dormant. Environmentalists also suspect involvement of local youths as informers of smuggling gangs.
Members of a Kozhikode-based river protection committee said that the demand made by environmentalists to construct strong pillars to block all illegal access roads to the banks of the river remained unimplemented. Though temporary barriers were erected, they were removed by the gangs, they added.
“One of the major demands raised by local administrators was the formation of a district-level squad of senior police officers to take stringent action against gangs involved in illegal sand mining. Though there were assurances to implement it, nothing has been done so far,” said a former member of the Mavoor grama panchayat.
Meanwhile, police sources from Mavoor station said their officers were doing everything possible to impound illegally operated boats used for sand mining. Several such metal boats had been recovered as part of their ongoing operations, they claimed.
