NEW DELHI, Tamil Nadu’s state archeology department has sent 45 proposals for the Centre’s approval to conduct archaeological excavations, the government told Parliament on Monday.
TN Archeology Department sent 45 excavation proposals for approval of Centre: Govt to ParliamentOf the twelve requests for mining sent in 2025, eight are “under consideration”, the government added.
DMK MP Kanimozhi also asked if the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court had recently ordered it to “consider positively and cooperate fully with any request” made by the Tamil Nadu government to continue archaeological excavations at Adichanallur in Thoothukudi.
To this, Union Culture Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat said in a written response, “Yes, sir.”
Kanimozhi represents Thoothukudi in the Lok Sabha.
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Shekhawat was also asked details of the number of requests received by the ASI from the Tamil Nadu government “seeking permission or cooperation” for archaeological excavations in the last five years and the current year, and the number of such requests approved, “rejected or pending with reasons for non-approval”.
In his response, the Union Minister shared the year-wise details of the proposals sent by the Tamil Nadu State Department of Archeology “for approval of the Government of India to conduct archaeological excavations” for 2021-2026.
According to the information, “45 proposals” have been sent by the State Archeology Department of Tamil Nadu for the Centre’s approval to conduct archaeological excavations.
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In 2025, it sent 12 proposals, of which four have been approved and the remaining eight are “under consideration,” according to the data.
The number of proposals received from the Tamil Nadu State Archeology Department in other years stood at: 12 in 2021, eight in 2022, three in 2023 and 10 in 2024. As per information all these requests were approved
In August 2025, MPs Kanimozhi and S. Venkatesan put questions to Shekhawat on Kizhadi mining in Tamil Nadu, which was mired in controversy.
Reports on the first two seasons of Kizhadi excavations were “scrutinized” by experts and “deficiencies” in methodology, chronology, interpretation, presentation and analytical rigor were reported to the chief excavator, the government told the Lok Sabha at the time.
He was also asked why there was a “delay” in releasing the excavation report of the Qizhadi archaeological site despite the completion of multiple excavation phases.
“The excavation report for the seasons 2014-15 and 2015-16 was accepted by the Archaeological Survey of India in January 2023 and has since been peer-reviewed as per standard protocols. This process is essential to ensure academic integrity and is not intended to delay or diminish the significance of the find,” he said.
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