By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, July 6: The state government which has been facing some heavy fire from the High Court of Meghalaya for its alleged complicity with the coal mining and transport mafia, has now virtually admitted that it is not capable of stopping the flourishing illegal trade.
It was none other than Chief Minister, Conrad K. Sangma who was unwavering in his assertion that people were resorting to illegal coal trade since they had been doing it for over 200 years and they had no other avenue to earn their livelihood.
Incidentally, the chief minister’s comments on coal mining came during his address at the Think20 Meghalaya Conference “Nature Solves: A New Framework for Our Sustainable Future”.
The CM’s candid admission comes at a time when the high court has, on numerous occasions, slammed the state government and higher-ups in the administration and the Police department for doing nothing to end illegal mining of coal and its transportation and also making illegal gains from the scam.
Even on Thursday, the court expressed unhappiness that the machinery in the state, be it the administration or the police, have been lacking in taking appropriate steps to arrest the illegal mining of coal in the state despite orders in such regard having been passed by the National Green Tribunal (NGT) and affirmed by the Supreme Court.
Justifying his stand, Sangma on Thursday put the blame squarely on the NGT for banning coal mining in 2014 without allowing any “transition time” for people to change their livelihood in a justified manner.
The CM recalled that the ban had a direct impact on coal mining in the state which has been prevalent for over 200 years, thereby affecting lakhs of people dependent on mining.
“You need to allow the system to change and give an option to the people to shift to something better…we cannot expect things to change overnight,” he said.
“The NGT should have taken the decision in the form of a transitory aspect where in the first five years you stop certain activities, then in the next five years you transit to new technology and in another five years you stop everything. You have to allow transition to take place in a justified manner which was missing,” he said.
“People suddenly woke up one morning and realized what they were doing for 200 years they cannot do it anymore and there were ripple effects,” he continued.
Reacting to the recent observations of the high court on the government’s failure to check illegal coal mining and transportation, he said, “Like people get punished for committing murder; similarly, there are different laws for people who indulge in illegal coal trade. Action is being taken…thousands of cases have been registered and people have been charge-sheeted.”
“Until and unless alternative form of livelihood is not there, people will keep going back to those activities and it is almost impossible for the administration to completely stop the illegal business,” he said.
Talking about the way forward, the chief minister said there are two solutions. “Either come up with a policy to legalise the coal trade or create alternative livelihood opportunities,” he said.
Sangma also said that four miners who have been granted prospective licence may start scientific mining of coal within a few months.
