Show cause notice to 57 mines for illegal operation

The Joda mining circle, under the state steel and mines department, has sent show cause notices to 57 mines for the irregularities and mining rule violations caused by them between 2001 and 2010.

“We found that some mine owners carried out mineral excavation without environment and forest and other statutory clearances. Some of them, who had all the necessary clearances with them, raised excess minerals than approved by the government bodies. So we have sent show cause notices to 57 mine owners,” U C Jena, deputy director of mines (DDM), Joda circle said.

“The errant miners have to reply within 7 days after receiving the government notices, else there mining licenses will be canceled,” he said.

The list of violators includes Rungta Sons, Tata Steel, KJS Alhuwalia, Patnaik Minerals, Essel Mining and BC Deb mines. Even mines controlled by government owned companies such as Odisha Mining Corporation (OMC) and Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) are also in the list. Most of the above miners have more than one mine in the list of offenders.

However, none of these mines are operational currently as some have shut down the mines on their own and some were forced to stop mining by the government. Joda circle had a total of 96 mines. Besides, these 57 errant mines, 12 mines have stopped operating 10 years ago while 27 mines are currently operating in this iron and manganese rich area.

Though the state government suspended as many as over 300 mines during 2009-10 after allegations of rampant illegal mining, transportation and exports, the proceedings against these mining rule offenders have begun only recently. In a separate development, the Joda DDM has cancelled mineral trading licenses of 50 firms as they did not provide information sought by the mining officer.

“We have cancelled the trading licenses of 50 firms out of notices sent to 224 firms, who were transporting minerals outside of the state for trading purpose,” Jena said.

Meanwhile, the government is considering a proposal to restrict or completely ban iron ore transport by road for export purpose citing deteriorating road conditions and to support rail transport for minerals.

But the main idea behind this proposal was to check illegal transportation as notorious traders often prefer the road network to export in absence of strong monitoring system compared to rail networks, said sources.