Additional info to Shah Commission by Sept end

The state steel & mines department has submitted the due compliance report to Justice M B Shah Commission of Enquiry and will submit additional information pertaining to illegal mining by the end of this month.

“We have submitted all facts related to mining activities in the state to the Shah Commission. The state had submitted its first report to the commission on May 13 and filed its next reply on June 1 this year.

Later on August10, the commission had sought some additional information on areas like lease wise production, exports, violations detected under Orissa Minerals (Prevention of Theft & Smuggling Rules)- OMPTS-2007 and action taken thereof. We will be submitting our response by the end of this month,” state minister for industries and steel & mines Raghunath Mohanty told reporters.

“The state government is fully cooperating with the Shah Commission in its probe into illegal mining activities,” he added. In its latest communication, the commission has sought the list of lessees in the state along with their complete address, phone numbers and e-mail addresses so as to enable the commission to prepare its final report as early as possible. The commission had asked the state steel & mines department to furnish the information.

The Centre had appointed an independent enquiry commission under Justice M B Shah, retired judge of Supreme court to investigate into cases of illegal mining in several states. The commission had recently begun inspections of some controversial mines in Goa.

The commission had earlier sent letters to 25 lessees with iron ore and manganese ore leases in the state.

However, the letters were returned without delivery by the postal department due to wrong address while two lessees had refused to accept the commission's letters.