CHENNAI: Madras High Court has bombarded a 72- year-old man, claiming to be an ocean scientist, for levelling reckless allegations against the State government in the matter of grant of licence to VV Minerals of mining baron S Vaikuntarajan.
“We must express our great anguish and pain at the manner in which the PIL forum is sought to be utilised by the petitioner...’’ observed Chief Justice SK Kaul and Justice Pushpa Sathyanarayana, on Tuesday.What made the judges to slam petitioner, G Victor Rajamaniackam, was his inability to produce material evidence in support of his serious allegations, despite repeated queries.
The PIL alleged that there was a massive corruption and illegality in the mining of beach sand minerals such as monazite, ilmenite, rutile, zircon, garnet, leucoxene and other associate minerals in the coastal districts of TN. The State machinery is subservient to the mafia involved in the mining. Vaikuntarajan and his associates have gained illegal monopoly and are engaged in mining the valuable minerals.
The bench noted that the petitioner hails from Madurai and after obtaining post-graduation in M.Sc geology, joined the Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad, for pursuing doctorate in mining geology. After obtaining Ph.D, he claims to have undergone specialized training in deep sea exploration in the technical university, Aatheri in Germany. He claims to be a scientist in the Indian National Institute of Oceonography, Goa, and was designated as chief investigator to prepare a plan for exploration of coastal minerals.
Despite all this, he had filed the PIL and failed to substantiate his claim by producing material evidence, the bench pointed out. When the bench indicated that it was inclined to pass an order, counsel for petitioner, sensing that it would be an adverse one, sought time for obtaining instructions from his client. And the bench adjourned the matter by two days, despite the objections raised by the senior counsel for Vaikuntarajan.