Yamunanagar: 43 villagers, 2 crusher owners booked for illegal mining

Tribune News Service

Yamunanagar, November 25

Forty-three persons of a single village and two owners of a stone crusher and a screening plant allegedly indulged in a massive illegal mining of 2 lakh MT of boulder, gravel and sand in Yamunanagar district.

No bills issued

• The accused are 43 residents of Nagli-32 village in Yamunanagar, besides two owners of a stone crusher and a screening plant
• They allegedly indulged in a massive illegal mining of 2 lakh MT of boulders, gravel and sand
• The processed material was sold without issuing e-rawana.

The authorities of the Mining Department said the 43 residents of Nagli-32 village extracted raw mining material (a mixture of boulder, gravel and sand) from their private land and other unknown places illegally and supplied the minerals to the said stone crusher and screening plant.

After processing of the mineral, the owners sold it without issuing e-rawana (bills), causing a huge loss of revenue to the government in terms of royalty and sales tax.

The stone crusher and the screening plant, which belong to one management, are also situated in Nagli-32 village.

On the complaint of Mining Inspector Aman, a case was registered against all 45 persons under Sections 379 of the IPC and 21 (1) of Mines and Minerals (Regulation of Development) Act, 1957, at the Bilaspur police station on Thursday.

A team of the Mines and Geology Department, Yamunanagar, comprising Assistant Mining Engineer Rajesh Sangwan, Mining Inspectors Rohit Singh and Arun Kumar, inspected the site of a stone crusher and a screening plant in Nagli-32 village recently. The team downloaded the sale and purchase record of mineral of the plants from the online portal.

The team found that there was no sale of processed mineral after October 15 and no purchase of raw mining mineral after June 10. Yet, there was regular sale and purchase of minerals of the said plants, but off the records.

“We procured three registers from both plants, showing manual entries of everyday sale and purchase of mineral, which has not been shown on the online portal,” said Rajesh Sangwan, Assistant Mining Engineer, Yamunanagar. He said, “The registers reveal date-wise entries of names of suppliers of illegal mineral, receipt numbers, vehicle numbers and mineral weight from April 1 to October 17.”

“It is shocking that 43 villagers, in connivance with the owners of these plants, illegally mined a huge quantity of minerals to the tune of 2,04,035 MT,” said Sangwan.

“As per the State Rules-2012, the royalty of illegally mined mineral alone comes out to be Rs 1,02,01,750, which excludes the price of minerals and penalty,” added Sangwan.

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