A Kerala High Court order quashes quarrying operations which had dealt a bodyblow to megalithic tombstones in the state
A RECENT ruling by the Kerala High
Court (HC) directed concerned
authorities to protect the prehistoric
remains in the Maraiyurvalley in Idukki
district from granite quarrying by
declaring them as national
monuments. It was ruled last November,
that quarrying would not be permitted
at the site. The, prehistoric tombs
- popularly known, as muniyaras
(caves of sages) -, as ancient monuments, would come under the Ancient
Monuments and Archaeological
Sites and Remains Act of 1958, the
Ancient Monuments Preservation Act
of 1904, and the Kerala Ancient
Monuments-and Archaeological Sites
and Remains Act'of 1969, following the
court order.
The ruling was the result of a
public interest writ petition filed by the
Kochi-based voluntary group -
Niyamavedi. The group feared that
quarrying in the valley would lead to
the destruction of Maraiyur's prehistoric tombs, says A X Verghese of
Niyamavedi. Following the petition,
a division bench of the Hc quashed an
earlier directive of a single bench to
grant a 107year long quarrying permission to a company in the Maraiyur valley.
Three years back, the company
began largescale granite quarrying in
the Maraiyur --valley disregarding
protests raised by some local inhabitants. There , were apprehensions
because the valley is adjacent to the
Eravikulam national park - home to
the Nilgiri tahr, an endangered species.
And blasts during granite quarrying
would be detrimental to the tomb structures, it was felt.
Says S P Thampi, superintending
archaeologist of the Kerala state, "These
tombs are the remains of a period ranging from 100 BC to AD 200." After
Thampi's research on the Maraiyur
muniyaras in 1973, the popular notion
that Kerala lacks a stone-age history was
belied. The research helped historians to
date the.history of the state back to
about 1,500 years. Consequently, the
site in the valley where cave paintings
were found, was declared by the state
department of archaeology in 1976 as
protected monument.
Unfortunately, unaware of their historical value of the structures, local
farmers who settled in Maraiyur from
the late '50s onwards, destroyed several
such dolmens. But recent studies have
now helped in enlightening the local
inhabitants about the heritage of their
state.
Therefore, when Niyamavedi decided
to take the case to the HC, it was widely
welcomed. Says Verghese, "As the
petition was before the single bench of
the High Court, for the first time in
the history of the court, the judge himself directly inspected the site." But, the
bench', permitted the company to
continue mining operation 50 in away
from the tombs. "Then we decided to
move to the division beach," informed
Verghese.
The division bench, comprising acting; chief justice K T Thomas and justice
P Shanmugam, asked the director general of the Archaeological Survey of
India (Asi), to submit a report specifically stating whether the blasting operation
would endanger the existence of the
muniyaras, and the steps to be taken to
prevent such activity.
Following this, the deputy superintending archaeologist, ASi (Madras circle), inspected the site and its surroundings and recommended that blasting be
discontinued as it would endanger the
ancient dolmens.
While environmentalists allege that
the callous inaction of the state departmerit of archaeology was responsible fbr
this kind of destructive activity department officials argue that granting of
permits for granite quarrying was
entirely in the hand of the revenue
department. "If the revenue department
hands over this land to the archaeology
department, we may be able to protect
these monuments," says S P Thampi
ruefully.
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