By Matters India Reporter
New Delhi, Feb 8, 2022: A Catholic bishop and five priests from Kerala, southern India, have been arrested on charges of illegal sand mining in the neighboring state of Tamil Nadu.
Tamil Nadu’s Tirunelveli district court has remanded all the six in judicial custody, but Bishop Samuel Mar Irenios Kaattukallil of Pathanamthitta and Father Jose Chamakala were admitted to the Government Medical College Hospital in Tirunelveli after they fell ill.
Other priests – diocesan vicar general Father Shaji Thomas Manikulam, George Samuel, Jijo James, and Jose Kalaviyal have been lodged in Nanguneri sub jail in Tirunelveli.
The six are accused of extracting sand illegally from the Tamirabarani (copper jar) river near Pottal, a village in Tirunelveli district, some 625 km southwest of Chennai, Tamil Nadu capital.
A statement from Father Joel P John Poweth, the public relations officer of the Pathanamthitta diocese, does not specify the arrest of the bishop and others.
However, Father Power acknowledges that the diocese owns 300 acres of land on the Ambasamudram taluq in Tirunelveli district. This town is situated in the foothills of Western Ghats on the northern bank of Tamirabarani river.
Father Poweth points out that the diocese had leased its land in Tirunelveli to one Manuel George for cultivation. “The diocesan officials could not go there for the past two years because of the Covid pandemic,” he explains.
When the diocese came to know that Manuel George had breached the contract, it initiated legal action to remove him from the contract, Father Poweth says.
Manuel George was arrested earlier at Kottayam in Kerala.
Bishop Irenios, as he is popularly known, is the second Catholic prelate in India to be arrested in criminal cases. Earlier in 2018, Bishop Franco Mulakkal of Jalandhar was arrested in the historic nun rape case.
The news Bishop Irenios’ arrest first appeared February 6 in thecommunemag.com, an online news platform in Tamil Nadu that claims to give “primacy to positive news from across the world while highlighting issues that need everybody’s attention.”
A police official told reporters that Manuel had obtained a license for storing, processing and consuming rough stone, gravel, crusher dust and sand from the diocesan property for five years from 2019.
Manuel then allegedly engaged in large-scale mining of river sand from Vandal Odai check dam and adjacent areas. The former sub collector of Cheranmahadevi inspected the area in September 2020 and found out that 27,774 cubic meters of sand had been illegally mined and transported for commercial purposes.
The sub collector imposed a penalty of 95.7 million rupees on the land owners under the Tamil Nadu Mines and Minerals Concession Rules, 1959. The sub-collector also suspended a sub inspector for aiding the illegal sand mining.
The sand mining was opposed by local people and environmentalists., who approached the Madurai Bench of Madras High Court. The bench in 2021, transferred the case from Kallidaikurichi police station to Crime Branch of the Crime Investigation Department for further probe.