A joint action committee of construction relation associations has announced a state-wide strike on July 6 in the wake of sand crunch and wants the State Government to ensure availability of the material and also bring down registration charges.

In the City, close to 2,000 members, including civil engineers, are expected to participate in a rally to the district collectorate that day. In Chennai, the members are planning a hunger strike.

Builders Association of India Coimbatore centre president K Rajavel said the construction industry had almost come to a halt due to lack of river sand. “Though the state government promised promotion of m-sand for construction, no action has been taken so far,” he told mediapersons today.

The Government should take action to open more quarries in the State and ensure sand availability. The government was not supporting entrepreneurs willing to set up m-sand units, he added. Even government construction work had been hit. This had affected nearly 5 lakh jobs.

Coimbatore Civil Engineers Association President R Karthick said m-sand was the way forward. “Though our former Chief Minister promised promotion of m-sand, the present Government hasn’t passed till date any order regarding this nor has it included m-sand in its list of construction raw materials published,” he said.

The State needs at least 40,000 loads of sand daily when the supply was just 1,000. “The price has also gone up drastically to Rs35,000-40,000 for a 2.75 unit when it was Rs10000 till recently,” he added.

Even the price of m-sand had gone up to Rs 6,000 a unit from Rs 2,000. There were hardly 15 m-sand production units in the state and mostly owned by private constructors.

The committee also wanted the Government to reduce stamp duty and registration charges from 4 per cent to the earlier 1 per cent. Including GST, the stamp duty and registration charges now would come to 11 per cent, committee members said, adding that it was 5-7 per cent in neighbouring States.

The rally will start from Women’s Polytechnic and the members will submit a memorandum to the Collector.