Kadavu committees, a District Expert Committee and a River Management Fund: Kerala's sand removal law

Background

Kerala announced on 2 November a plan to overhaul its Water Resources Department and the Kerala Water Authority, with a common water policy to be framed and a Kerala Water Conclave to be held, alongside its move to the Supreme Court on Mullaperiyar dam safety. One standing part of the State's water law is a Kerala Act of 2001 on the protection of river banks and the regulation of sand removal. That Act gives the word Kadavu a legal meaning: a river bank or a water body from which sand is taken. At each such place there is a Kadavu Committee constituted under Section 4. Above those committees sits a District Expert Committee constituted under Section 3, and a State High Level Committee added by an amendment of 2013. The authorised officer under the Act is the Commissioner of Land Revenue. Money raised under the Act goes into a River Management Fund kept under Section 17, and the 2013 amendment also provided for a Special Protection Force. For the purposes of the Act, the local authority is a village panchayat or a municipality.