Four more quarries go under hammer

Rachna Khaira

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Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, November 28

The Punjab Mining Department, reported to have auctioned surplus mining sites, auctioned another quarry today.

While the department put four quarries under hammer this time, it could only sell one owing to the high price tag attached to these sites.

The quarry at Silkiana village in Phillaur was auctioned at Rs 4.52 crore, while no takers were found for the other three quarries situated in Danewal, Chak Wadala and Vehra villages. Sources claimed that the sand rates had come down immensely in the past few months following an increase in the auction of sand mining sites.

Also, following a monopoly of the sand mafia in the trade where illegal sand mining is allegedly going on in connivance with the industry and police officials across the state, the contractors were finding it difficult to make profit through the “legal way”.

According to the district survey report, Jalandhar has over 1,113 thousand sq m of area which has a potential of 36 lakh tonnes of sand.

However, the department has already auctioned over 1587 sq m of area having potential of 42 lakh tonnes.

The district has reported a shortage of -4.44 lakh tonnes of sand mining through legally auctioned mines. This is excluding the illegal mining statistics reported in lakhs of tonnes in the 85-km stretch from Panj Dhera village in Phillaur to Mehatpur, Shahkot, Malsian, and to Gidderpindi village in Kapurthala. While the Punjab Mining Department has identified over 14 quarries spread in over 110-hectare area, only four could get the clearance certificate from the Environment Ministry so far.

However, Mukesh Khanna, GM (Industries-cum-Mining) said that from now onwards, the department has made changes in the auction process. “The department will now auction the mine and the contractor will get the environmental clearance from the ministry concerned,” said Khanna. He added that the district had further identified over 243000 sq m area on river Sutlej as mineable mineral potential area which had over 74 lakh tonnes of mining potential reported in a survey conducted recently.

While the department had auctioned around 43 mines in the state, the operation of over 18 mines could not get started because of the delay in environment clearance granted by the SEIAA. Also, the operation of another 19 mines could not be started because of various reasons that include consent to operate, delay in the installation of Weighment Bridge and incomplete demarcation process.