VILLUPURAM: Surrounded by deep quarries and stone crushers, a lone patch of green now feels like a prison. A family of 11, including four school-going children and an elderly woman, has been stuck for the past one week in the isolated land where they have farmed and lived for decades in Nalmukkal village, around 15 km from Tindivanam, after a quarry owner blocked all access routes by erecting fences as part of an alleged tactic to pressurise them into selling their property.
The seven-acre plot owned by brothers E Selvam (47) and E Ravichandran (51) is located a kilometre from the main village where around 700 families live. The quarry owner, K Paramasivam, has bought all adjacent parcels of land, including a few leased earlier by the brothers for cultivation, by paying prices disproportionately higher than the market value.
Last week, he fenced off a mud road – the family’s last remaining access to the outside world – effectively marooning them.
“He has quarried most of the land to the maximum extent possible, some to depths beyond 300 feet. Now he wants our land too, since stones are found just 10 feet below the surface. But we are firm not to sell since this was bought by our father 60 years ago and it has fed us ever since,” said Ravichandran.
The family, including the wives of two brothers, their mom and sister, cultivates paddy, watermelon, and seasonal rainfed crops.
‘Cops refused to intervene when fence was erected’
Of the five children in the household, only a Class 7 boy has been able to go to the nearby government school as he happened to be staying with relatives. The other four, including three girls studying in Classes 3 to 5, have not gone to school since the road was blocked.
“If I fall sick, I can’t even go to a hospital. The recent rains worsened the condition. We now feel very insecure,” said E Pushpa (80), the mother. When TNIE visited the family, the team was warned by those in Nalmukkal to be careful about explosives used in the quarry that are detonated without warnings.
From the nearest bitumen road, TNIE had to walk nearly 750 metres through a slushy road, feet sinking nearly up to the ankle, to reach the fenced-off stretch. The family’s home lies another 50 metres beyond the fence. They are currently surviving on stocked-up vegetables and groceries, with occasional support from neighbours.
A well in their farmland is their sole source of water for drinking and farming. Paramasivam, who owns multiple quarries and crushers in the area, claimed, “I have fenced my patta land. It does not include government land or anyone else’s property.”
The women in the family said they called the police when the fence was erected last Tuesday, but officers refused to intervene, citing it as a civil dispute. They added that a complaint was earlier submitted at the Villupuram collector’s office, but no action has been taken.
With the family residing and using the path for decades, they are entitled to easementary rights as per the Indian Easements Act. However, the revenue officials have showed little urgency in resolving the issue. “Both parties have patta for their respective lands.
We requested Paramasivam to allow a path, but he refused. We will arrange a meeting soon,” said Marakanam Tahsildar Neelaveni, who visited the site on Tuesday. TNIE learnt that another team of revenue officials visited the spot on Wednesday for inquiry after we contacted the collector’s office for a response.
According to Nalmukkal villagers, at least four quarries and more than 10 stone crushers are operating in the locality that were once farmland.