Chennai: With the Centre awarding oil and gas exploration contracts to Vedanta and ONGC reportedly in blocks of Tamilnadu, the state government Tuesday said it would not allow any project “affecting” the citizens, while opposition Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) announced a protest against the “fascist” Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government.
Of the oil and gas exploration areas awarded under India’s maiden open acreage auction, mining mogul Anil Agarwal-led Vedanta Limited has bagged 41 of the 55 blocks offered in OALP-1. The firm is at the centre of a row in Tamilnadu, following the closure of its Sterlite Copper plant in Tuticorin over environmental concerns, even as 13 anti-Sterlite protesters were killed in police firing in that town on 22 and 23 May.
Vedanta Limited has reportedly won contracts for two Cauvery offshore blocks, while State-run ONGC has bagged one in Cuddalore district. Tamilnadu has also witnessed protests by farmers, citizens and political parties against hydrocarbon projects in Kathiramangalam and Neduvasal in Thanjavur and Pudukottai districts, respectively.
Responding to reporters’ queries on the awarding of oil exploration contracts, Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam insisted that the government would not allow any project that affected the people. “The government will totally oppose any project that could affect the people of Tamilnadu,” he said.
Meanwhile, the DMK flayed the Centre for awarding the contracts in the Cauvery delta area and announced a protest against the “fascist BJP government” on the matter. “Ever since the fascist BJP government took over at the Centre, it is implementing schemes like hydrocarbon (exploration), Sterlite, GAIL (pipeline project) and Nutrino observatory, which are against Tamilnadu,” DMK president MK Stalin said in a statement.
Exploration of hydrocarbons in the Cauvery delta area would turn the region into a desert, he added. Referring to Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan signing contracts with Vedanta and ONGC on Monday, Stalin claimed that the blocks in Tamilnadu were located in Chidambaram for ONGC and at two places in the Cauvery delta for Vedanta.
The DMK leader said any such project would turn the Cauvery delta, which was Tamilnadu’s “rice bowl,” into a desert and severely affect the farmers in the region. His party would stage a protest demonstration at Thiruvarur on 3 October against this, he said, adding that the DMK MLAs from the region and others would participate in it.