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Despite ban, Illegal mining on rise in Jaisinghpur

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Tractor trailers can be seen extracting mining material from the riverbed in an unscientific manner.
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Ravinder Sood

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Jaisinghpur, July 12

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Tall claims made by the state Mining Department and Kangra police that there was no illegal mining going on in the Jaisinghpur area of Palampur region have proved hollow as the ground realities are entirely different.

The Tribune team on Tuesday visited the areas prone to illegal mining in the Jaisinghpur subdivision and witnessed that large-scale illegal mining was still going on in the Beas in connivance with the police and the Mining Department. The pictures clicked corroborated the fact.

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Dozens of trucks, JCB machines and tractor trailers can be seen extracting mining material from the riverbed in an unscientific manner round the clock.

Though the state government has issued a notification imposing ban on illegal mining in the Beas following orders of the Himachal Pradesh High Court and subsequent directions of the National Green Tribunal (NGT), the Kangra administration has so far failed to check the illegal mining in the river, particularly near Kothan village.

Residents of area, including panchayat pardhans, told The Tribune that because of the apathetic attitude of the police, mining and forest departments the illegal and unscientific mining had flourished in the past one year.

They said as and when the issue was highlighted in the media, illegal mining was stopped by the police for a day or two. Then after the lapse of some time, the illegal mining was resumed under the protection of the police and the Mining Department.

Despite specific ban imposed by the government and court on the use of heavy machinery like JCB machines, heavy equipment are openly used for mining. SDM Jaisinghpur Ashwani Sood said he had sought constitution of a flying squad to curb illegal mining in the Jaisinghpur area in May this year, but even after the expiry of three months no headway had been made and illegal mining was on the rise. He said an SDM or the Revenue Department alone could not take action against the offenders without the assistance of police and mining departments. Owners of the stone crushers extracting mining material from the Beas claimed that they had valid lease permits issued by the Mining Department for extracting the mining material from the Beas and its tributaries. However, when asked to show the permits, none of them could produce the copies of lease permits to this reporter.

District Mining Officer Harvinder Singh also admitted that a limited area of land had been leased out for mining. He clarified that no lease permits had been granted for mining along with the river bank on the government land.

Significantly, as per the directions of the NGT, HP High Court and state government, the Mining Department was bound to earmark the area allotted for mining with cemented pillars carrying red flags so that illegal mining was not carried out outside the leased area.But no such pillars or marking were seen in the area. The state Geologist in his letter dated February 22, 2018 has also directed the mining officer to earmark the areas leased for land but no follow-up action has been taken.

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