MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Tuesday directed that petitions challenging the order of the Director of Geology and Mining imposing a three-month ban on transporting minerals to other states be placed before the Chief Justice of the Madras High Court to decide where the cases should be heard.

Liphin Ponnusamy Leela of Vilavancode in Kanniyakumari district filed the petition, contending that the blanket ban imposed by the State government on transporting minerals across Tamil Nadu’s borders had brought his lawful business to a standstill, causing immense financial distress and resulting in a breach of existing commercial contracts. At the previous hearing, the court had directed the State and central governments to file their responses.

When the case came up for hearing before a Division Bench comprising Justices CV Karthikeyan and S Sakthivel, counsel appearing for the government informed the court that a similar case had recently been heard by the Chief Justice of the Madras High Court and was pending there.

However, the Counsel for the petitioner submitted that the present petition was already pending before the Madurai Bench and urged the court to hear the matter and pass orders.

After hearing their arguments, the court directed the Registrar to transfer the petition pending before the Madurai Bench to the Madras High Court, so that the Chief Justice could consider where the matter should be heard.