Bantwal Taluk Tahsildar, Ravi Chandar Naik on Thursday (March31) led revenue offials in a raid, a sand-mining location at Malli, on the banks of Nethravathi River in Pudu village, which had finally powdered sand for construction works.
Naik had received reports about illegal sand lifting activities, and violations of law earlier. He and Bantwal rural police SI found that some machines were at work, illegally picking fine powdered sands by scoops.
Law demanded that sand be only manually, and not by machines.
But the lease-holder Lateef, having permission only for manual work, was using large machines. The Dept. of Mines and Geology had to take action against Lateef, said Tahsildars who did not know how to handle Lateef and his workers.
DC Subodh Yadav in Mangalore brushed the incident aside, as an everyday affair. Revenue officials were carrying out raids as well, without involving Mine and Geology Dept, he explained.