Mettupalayam has always been the vegetable town that leads to the holidays destination Ooty. Spread over on the southern and northern banks of River Bhavani, the town with over four lakh population has been struggling hard to balance environment protection and development.
The Mettupalayam Assembly constituency includes the Mettupalayam Municipality, the town panchayats of Sirumugai, Karamadai, Gudalur, No. 4 Veerapandi and village panchayats in the Karamadai Panchayat Union.
Agriculture is the primary occupation - banana, vegetables and areca nut being the important crops. The farmers there face challenges in clean water for cultivation, crop destruction from wild animals, and good price. T.T. Rangasamy of the Bhavani River Water and Groundwater Protection Council says that effluents discharged from the textile and paper industries have made the river water unfit for cultivation. That the water is also polluted by sewage from households and the Mettupalayam town residents don’t get clean drinking water is another issue.
The farmers in forest fringes face the threat of crop destruction by wild animals, particularly wild boar. For the farming community, this is an important issue, which the next representative in the Tamil Nadu Assembly should address, he says.
For the residents, supply of polluted water and that too at irregular intervals is a big problem, says N. Venkataraman of the Mettupalayam Consumer Protection Organisation. The town does not have underground drainage facility. The result is that untreated sewage enters River Bhavani, from where the municipality draws water for drinking water supply.
This is the most important issue for not only the town’s residents but also those in other towns and villages who depend on the river for water.
The other issue that comes to the fore from voters is de-congesting the Mettupalayam town. They want the next elected representative to take steps to complete the road-over bridge at Karamadai railway crossing, Mettupalayam bypass road from Karamadai through Guddaiyur and extend the road leading to Ooty.
The other solution that the next MLA should try is for increasing the frequency of the Mettupalayam-Coimbatore train service as that will decongest the road, says L.S. Sidduram, advisor, Mettupalayam Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
The vegetable traders, who are an economic pillar for the town and nearby areas, have shifted mundies to outside the town. The potato traders are the ones who still remain in Mettupalayam. The next government should take steps to move them and also workshops and scrap merchants to further decongest Mettupalayam, he adds.
The voters’ other demands include an industrial estate or park in Karamadai to encourage entrepreneurs to set shop there, a marketing society for farmers to protect prices and facilities for handloom weavers in Sirumugai and Chikkadasampalayam.
Politically, this constituency has been with the AIADMK since 2001. AIADMK’s A.K.Selvaraj won that election by over 40,000 votes. Since then it has been a direct contest between the AIADMK and DMK. In the 2006 election, the DMK’s B.Arunkumar lost by a wafer-thin margin of 142 votes.
This time, the AIADMK has fielded incumbent O.K. Chinnaraj. DMK has fielded S. Surendran and the TMC has given T.S. Shanmugasundaram as part of the Peoples Welfare Alliance.
The Mettupalayam Assembly constituency includes the Mettupalayam Municipality, the town panchayats of Sirumugai, Karamadai, Gudalur, No. 4 Veerapandi and village panchayats in the Karamadai Panchayat Union.
Agriculture is the primary occupation - banana, vegetables and areca nut being the important crops. The farmers there face challenges in clean water for cultivation, crop destruction from wild animals, and good price. T.T. Rangasamy of the Bhavani River Water and Groundwater Protection Council says that effluents discharged from the textile and paper industries have made the river water unfit for cultivation. That the water is also polluted by sewage from households and the Mettupalayam town residents don’t get clean drinking water is another issue.
The farmers in forest fringes face the threat of crop destruction by wild animals, particularly wild boar. For the farming community, this is an important issue, which the next representative in the Tamil Nadu Assembly should address, he says.
For the residents, supply of polluted water and that too at irregular intervals is a big problem, says N. Venkataraman of the Mettupalayam Consumer Protection Organisation. The town does not have underground drainage facility. The result is that untreated sewage enters River Bhavani, from where the municipality draws water for drinking water supply.
This is the most important issue for not only the town’s residents but also those in other towns and villages who depend on the river for water.
The other issue that comes to the fore from voters is de-congesting the Mettupalayam town. They want the next elected representative to take steps to complete the road-over bridge at Karamadai railway crossing, Mettupalayam bypass road from Karamadai through Guddaiyur and extend the road leading to Ooty.
The other solution that the next MLA should try is for increasing the frequency of the Mettupalayam-Coimbatore train service as that will decongest the road, says L.S. Sidduram, advisor, Mettupalayam Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
The vegetable traders, who are an economic pillar for the town and nearby areas, have shifted mundies to outside the town. The potato traders are the ones who still remain in Mettupalayam. The next government should take steps to move them and also workshops and scrap merchants to further decongest Mettupalayam, he adds.
The voters’ other demands include an industrial estate or park in Karamadai to encourage entrepreneurs to set shop there, a marketing society for farmers to protect prices and facilities for handloom weavers in Sirumugai and Chikkadasampalayam.
Politically, this constituency has been with the AIADMK since 2001. AIADMK’s A.K.Selvaraj won that election by over 40,000 votes. Since then it has been a direct contest between the AIADMK and DMK. In the 2006 election, the DMK’s B.Arunkumar lost by a wafer-thin margin of 142 votes.
This time, the AIADMK has fielded incumbent O.K. Chinnaraj. DMK has fielded S. Surendran and the TMC has given T.S. Shanmugasundaram as part of the Peoples Welfare Alliance.