GUWAHATI
A Meghalaya-based rights group has accused the alliance government in the State of encouraging illegal coal mining in contempt of a Supreme Court order.
This follows a scathing attack by the Opposition Congress in the 60-member Meghalaya Assembly over the issue of illegal mining and transportation of coal as Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma insisted several stringent measures had been taken, including cases registered against some 2,000 people for flouting the ban.
The National Green Tribunal (NGT) had in April 2014 imposed the ban on rat-hole coal mining in Meghalaya. The State government later claimed tonnes of already extracted coal lying around various mining sites needed to be transported to prevent the local environment from being polluted.
“Instead of objectively identifying the volume and location of extracted coal, the State government sought self-declaration from the coal miners for receiving mineral transportation challan to transport and sell their coal,” the NGO Thma U Rangli-Juki said on Wednesday.
The extracted coal quantity was reportedly inflated. The NGT subsequently ordered the government to set up a committee for issuing necessary guidelines regarding identification of such “extracted coal”.
The committee headed by former Chief Secretary K.S. Kropha found that the volume of extracted coal by the miners was either non-existent or had been inflated.
Coal miners had in December 2018 told the Supreme Court, which had upheld the NGT ban, that 1.77 lakh metric tonnes of extracted coal were left to be transported.
“How was it that the Secretary to Meghalaya’s Mining and Geology Department filed an additional affidavit in the court on April 10, 2019, claiming there was 32.57 lakh metric tonnes of coal yet to be transported?” the NGO asked.
It added that challans were issued illegally and the government used the COVID-19 lockdowns and partial lockdowns to facilitate illegal transportation of coal.
The Congress too sought an explanation from the State government about the mismatch in the figures of extracted coal volume. The party’s MLA George Lyngdoh asked where the trucks carrying coal were coming from if the coal mining operations, as the government claimed, had not resumed since the ban and more than 32 lakh metric tonnes were still waiting to be auctioned for transporting.
Mr. Sangma defended the figure, blaming the Congress for “creating” the 32 lakh metric tonnes during its rule. He said the entire process of assessing the coal was submitted to the NGT but the auctioning had to be delayed because of lack of approval from the relevant authorities.
The Chief Minister, however, admitted that the government had been facing the challenges of illegal coal mining and transportation. “We have filed almost 2,000 cases in the past five years,” he said, adding that the government had taken steps such as issuing high-security challans with special ink and hologram, forming a taskforce and joint patrolling of police and mining officials at different locations in the State.
