The editorials here have harped on the illegalities that are allowed to carry on with impunity insofar as coal mining is concerned. Chief Minister Conrad Sangma has taken the view that a traditional livelihood activity dating back to 200 years cannot be done away with by a sleight of hand of the National Green Tribunal (NGT). The Government has also maintained that mining happens in distant places and the police lack the wherewithal to reach those areas. It is in this context that the Supreme Court had ordered for posting central police forces in those areas. Surprisingly the Union Home Ministry which should have responded positively to that order has instead shot it down. Is this not a signal from the Home Ministry that the illegality should continue perhaps after consulting the State Government? Central forces without a vested interest would have gone hammer and tongs at the illegal mining and the mine owners and perhaps brought a halt to such criminality. It is a known fact that those with political clout are either coal mine owners or their family members are in the business. It would not be wrong to assume that much of the political funding for elections also come from the coal mining profits.
The NGT first came down heavily on coal mining based on a petition filed by the Dima Hasao Students’ Union on the plea that the rivers flowing from East Jaintia Hills towards Dima Hasao district in Assam are laden with acid mine drainage and hence toxic and no longer potable. Later the NGT also took note of the deaths in different coal mines across the state that went unreported. The death of at least 15 persons in the coal mine at Ksan, East Jaintia Hills in December 2018 after the mine flooded, had sounded alarm bells across the country. Despite the Indian Navy and Air Force trying to render assistance to retrieve the bodies from the mines, they failed. Naturally those who die inside the mines are poor labourers from Nepal, Bangladesh and now quite a good number from Assam. That fact alone renders them vulnerable since mine owners could not care less about mine safety measures and they don’t follow the Mines and Mineral Development & Regulation (MMDR) Act.
In the latest reported case too, the labourer who died is from Hojai, Assam and hence there is no hue and cry. If the victim were to have been a local person perhaps the reaction of the people too would have been different. So, whose livelihoods are being served since the locals don’t enter the mines any longer as they fear for their lives and the mine owners are not all locals for only the wealthy can engage in the coal business. It follows therefore that there is a vested interest in the continued support for coal mining because it serves a political purpose – it funds elections. The argument that coal is a livelihood for the locals is therefore flawed and not based on any data to establish the realities of the coal mining business today in Meghalaya. The fact that there is not a single voice of protest against what is a criminal activity suggests that all are paid to remain silent. That’s the pattern of governance in Meghalaya today.
