Centre could have probed illegal mining, says TMC

SHILLONG, Feb 18: Trinamool Congress (TMC) state vice president George B Lyngdoh on Saturday asked what prevented the central agencies from conducting a probe into alleged illegal mining and transportation of coal when the High Court of Meghalaya termed the activities as “state-sponsored”.
He alleged the MDA government is setting a dangerous trend by seeking to hand over mining to a handful of people.
The TMC vice president said while making an appeal in 2016 for the lifting of the ban on mining, the state government had told the central government that the tribals in Meghalaya have land rights and therefore, the mining rights should be given back to them.
“Now, the state government is pushing people to get 100 acres of land under one name and one umbrella and then, ask them to mine under one singular person,” George B Lyngdoh said.
“Do you think everybody will be benefited by this? Do you think the small miners, who have small land holdings and small kinds of mining areas, will benefit from this? They will be cheated. People will be cheated,” he said.
The TMC leader said people will eventually lose their land. He said in order to get back the rights for indigenous mining activities, it is important to understand the implications of how the existing laws will affect the people of the state.
“There were many differences in terms of indigenous activities if we look at the caves of Sohra and the coal-related activities that happened there. There are a lot of good practices that happened,” the TMC leader said, adding, “We will have to study the kind of practices that were done by our forefathers.”