Madras High Court's Madurai Bench on Wednesday ordered that construction work on the second plant of Vedanta's Sterlite Copper at Thoothukudi be stopped with immediate effect. The development comes a day after 12 people were killed in police firing during protests against the Sterlite factory in Tamil Nadu.
The order comes on a public interest litigation petition filed against Sterlite's application for renewal of environmental clearance for the proposed second plant, which was meant to double its copper refining capacity to 800,000 tonnes.
A Division Bench of Justices Anita Sumanth and M Sundar said that the application