Our Bureau
Tura/Shillong, Dec 7: Former MLA of Rongara-Siju Rophul Marak has written to the Director of Mineral Resources (DMR) seeking verification of the coal dumps e-auctioned in the districts of Jaintia Hills.
He alleged a scrutiny of the auction would reveal more cases of rat-hole mining in the Nongalbibra area as most of the winning bids were from Garo Hills.
One lakh MT of coal was auctioned. The transportation of the same coal would be unfeasible if one wanted to run the auctioned coal through the various land ports in Garo Hills from Jaintia Hills.
The e-bids were won by Chesrang A Sangma, Ruthina D Marak, Rukmani R Marak, Mahalaxmi Continental Ltd, Jai Maa Coal Pvt Ltd and Vaishno Devi Traders Pvt Ltd.
Altogether 2,400 MT of coal has been awarded to Chesrang, 38,970 MT to Rukmani and 49,390 MT Ruthina. The others got a total of 400 MT in the e-auction concluded recently.
“There is nothing to show that the said persons, who got huge winning bids, have anything to do with the coal trade. Neither do they have the sources to take such huge bids. As you are aware, there are huge dumps of illegal coal in the Gasuapara area in South Garo Hills (SGH) and these will be transported in the guise of auctioned coal,” Rophul claimed.
Chesrang’s bid cost him Rs 58,00,200. Rukmani had to shell out over Rs 9.52 crore while Ruthina spent over Rs 17 crore.
Rophul said the modus operandi of such transportation is to use the auctioned coal as a front for illegally-mined coal in SGH district that ultimately lands into Bangladesh through the Gasuapara Land Customs Station (LCS).
He said the matter was placed before the court and it expressed concern that illegally-mined coal was making its way into the neighbouring country even after it (court) had issued an order against the same.
“We apprehend that the auctioned coal will not be transported using the designated route and (as per) the quantity mentioned. Freshly-extracted coal, especially from Garo Hills, will be transported using these challans,” he said.
Further, Rophul expressed doubt over the quantity of coal mentioned in the auction actually being present at the Coal India Limited depots in Jaintia Hills.
“It seems the e-auction is nothing but a means to transport illegally-extracted coal across the state. This has to be investigated and monitored so that such acts are not allowed to become normal,” he said.
The former MLA sought an inquiry into the matter. He insisted that before the lifting of coal from the depots in question, it should first be verified that coal was available.
“Records of lifting trucks, including registration, driver details, GPS tags as well as sealing of trucks, need to be done to prevent tampering. These trucks should also be recorded at each check gate that they pass through,” he stated in a complaint to the DMR director.
He further wrote: “In the case of export, all records, including shipment weight, passes of check gates should be kept on record so that the same can be cross-verified and tallied.”
The letter was submitted in Shillong on Wednesday.