The pictures provided by the Sangharsh Committee showing the areas allegedly affected by illegal mining in the Hajipur-Talwara area of Hoshiarpur district.
Our Correspondent
Hajipur (Hoshiarpur), October 16
The Khanan Roko Zameen Bachao Sangharsh Committee held a meeting here today in which it accused the administration of promoting mining mafia.
The committee resolved to speed up its struggle against the mining mafia and its reported nexus with the administartion and politicians.
The Sangharsh Committee leaders Dharminder Singh, Gian Singh Gupta, Sukhwinder Singh Wahla, Bikramjit Singh, Jasvir Tote, Sudesh Kumari, Pushpa Devi and Hemraj alleged that the Mukerian police and the administration were helping those involved in illegal mining.
Showing photographs of alleged fresh mining near villages, and close to Beas river, the Sangharsh Committee leaders said the civil and police administration were hand in glove with illegal mining mafia. They alleged that no action was taken against the mafia on people’s complaints, but the complainants were facing harassment with false cases.
Questioning the performance of the civil and police administration, they said the movement of heavy overloaded vehicles, including tractor-trailers, was continuing unchecked. They condemned the action taken by the civil and police administration in Chakk Mirpur village under the guise of court order. Accusing the administration of promoting mining mafia, they alleged that under the name of government recognition to crushers in the area, the administration was trying to legalise the illegal digging up to 50 to 60 feet depth of agricultural land and Beas river.
In these villages, stone crusher owners had received no objection certificates from the PPCB on condition of getting the raw material from the states of Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh. They said on the other side of the river Beas, Himachal Pradesh’s region of Mandur and Mandang Sanour in HP were struggling under the Banner of Environment Protection Committee against illegal mining. They said soon meetings of the struggle committees of the affected villages would be called and a strategy would be devised for the next course of action.
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