Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin on Thursday cracked the whip by stripping the lucrative mining portfolio from K Duraimurugan, the senior-most member of the council of ministers and the ruling DMK’s general secretary following mounting complaints of massive irregularities in the mining sector.

In a minor cabinet reshuffle, the Chief Minister reallocated the portfolios of Duraimurugan and Law and Prisons Minister S Regupathy.

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While Duraimurugan has been assigned the Law portfolio along with Irrigation, which he has been holding, Regupathy has been allotted Mining and Minerals. This development comes at a time when assembly elections are due early next year.

Complaints of rampant illegal mining have been pouring in and recently an activist, Akbar Ali, fighting against unlicensed quarrying, was murdered in Pudukottai district in which the local police were accused of being complicit in it.

There were protests in many districts including Kanniyakumari, where rocky- mountains have been devoured and Karur as well as other districts to protect natural resources from mining. To top it all, former IAS officer U Sagayam, who exposed the massive multi-crore granite quarrying scam in 2014, has earlier this week refused to appear before a Special Court to give evidence fearing threat to his life.

This reshuffle assumes significance since Duraimurugan’s son and Vellore MP, Kathir Anand is under the scanner of the Enforcement Directorate in a money laundering case. Also, this comes close on the heels of the resignations of former Minister for Electricity, Prohibition and Excise V Senthil Balaji and former Minister Forests, K Ponmudy following judicial heat.

Senthil Balaji had to step down following the Supreme Court ultimatum on whether he chooses to remain in the cabinet or cancellation bail in a PMLA case, Ponmudy had to quit following Madras High Court directing registration of an FIR against him for hate speech for derogatory remarks against Saivism and Vaishnavism.

Senior most member of the DMK, Duraimurugan, who is in his sunset years, is a steadfast loyalist of the DMK’s first family and a party strongman in Vellore district.

However, analysts observe that the exit of Senthil Balaji and Ponmudy as well stripping of Duraimurugan from the mining portfolio were to offset the opposition attack on the DMK on the issue of corruption that too when election is round the horizon.