TURA, March 13: At least 500 illegal stone quarries are reportedly being run near Phulbari.
This has come to light after the West Garo Hills (WGH) district issued an order banning the mining the stones without the completion of the legal process.
Some locals have said there are almost 300 small illegal stone quarries on the Chibinang-Bikkonggre-Dadenggre road. A visit to the area with members of the Achik Youth Movement for Betterment of Society (AYMBS) showed there are almost twice as many.
All the sites visited were small in scale yielding 3-5 pick-up trucks full of stones per day.
The first quarry at Chambakpara, about 3 km from Chibinang, could be accessed through a pineapple farm. The labourers there ran for cover when the team reached the spot, but the signs of stone quarrying were evident, including a tiffin carrier with food.
The second quarry site, about 200 metres from the first, had four labourers, including a woman extracting stones from holes dug in the ground. Water was seeping from these holes.
Quarriers 3 and 4 were much larger and had more labourers working. One Meher Ali, the owner of the quarry, said he had no permission to operate apart from a note from the Nokma of the area. The land, he added, had been leased out to him for ₹5,000 a year.
Visits to at least eight quarries made it clear that small businessmen from Chibinang were operating the quarries with the go-ahead from the Nokmas.
“This unscientific method of quarrying is threatening to affect groundwater. These acts show that Nokmas have been careless in protecting our lands. They have also sold our forests for peanuts. If this continues, there will no longer be hills in Garo Hills,” AYMBS president, Peter A. Sangma said.
After visiting at least six quarries in Chambakpara, the team went to Dudangre, about 4 km away. The village, locals said, has about 130 households but at least 100 small illegal stone quarries.
A few have been abandoned but a few chose to remain.
“There may be about 500 here, but places in and around Chibinang and Phulbari are filled with more such quarries. It is difficult to get the actual number as many of the quarries are in remote places, only visited by those that know their location,” Mr Sangma said.
The district and forest administration, informed about the matter, expressed shock at the findings while promising to immediately look into the matter.
“We will deploy a team to investigate the matter with immediate effect,” said WGH deputy commissioner Ram Singh.
Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) of West and South West Garo Hills, Rupankar Marak too said action in the matter would be taken.
“I will depute staff with immediate effect tomorrow. We didn’t know that there were that many,” Marak said.
The DFO added they have been fighting these illegal acts, but they keep coming back despite many offence reports in the court.