Pralhad Joshi, on Twitter, said the decision to exempt Tamil Nadu was taken based on the welfare of the people of Tamil Nadu.
“BJP Tamil Nadu president K Annamalai rushed to call upon me in Bengaluru with a request to exclude 3 lignite mines from the auction in the 7th tranche. In the spirit of cooperative federalism and keeping in mind the interest of people of TN, I have directed to exclude them from auction,” tweeted Pralhad Joshi.
After the Union government announced the auction for mining coal in 111 blocks across the country, including three blocks in Tamil Nadu, on March 29 this year, there was a huge uproar in the state as all three blocks fell in the agriculture-protected zone in the Cauvery delta region, the state’s rice bowl. The three blocks were in Sethiathope in Cuddalore district, Michaelpatti in the Ariyalur district and Vadachery in the Thanjavur district.
Leaders of all the political parties opposed the Union government’s announcement. Chief minister M K Stalin wrote a letter to the Prime Minister urging him to withdraw the announcement. A special calling attention motion was moved in the state assembly, during which both Stalin and industries minister Thangam Thennarasu assured that the project would not be implemented.
The same day, Annamalai, along with BJP’s in-charge for Tamil Nadu C T Ravi, met Pralhad Joshi and urged him to drop the process of auctioning coal mines in the state. Annamalai, on Twitter, thanked PM Modi and Joshi for removing the coal blocks from the auction.
“We thank our PM Narendra Modi and Minister Pralhad Joshi for considering our request and removing the coal blocks in TN’s delta region from the coal auction list #vanakkammodi,” tweeted Annamalai.
