Sand mining ban: SC blows away govt’s defence like castle in sand

In a huge blow to Rajasthan government, the Supreme Court has refused to lift ban on sand mining. Instead of lifting ban, the division bench of Justice Madan B Lokur and Justice Deepak Gupta rather pulled up the state government making some harsh comments.

“You (state government) is creating mining mafia and they are killing people,” the bench said. It also asked state government’s lawyer P S Narisamhan to explain how sand is necessary for construction works. The bench cited World Trade Tower in United States where no bajri was used for the construction. It also gave example of some other countries like Bhutan where bajri  is not used in construction activities.

The Supreme Court has asked environment ministry to submit a study report in six weeks. It has also asked the ministry to explain why bajri is required in construction activities

The state government had pleaded before the apex court that complete ban on sand mining was wrong. It had asked the court to allow sand mining to 12 lease holders who had received environment clearance.  

But, the Supreme Court said that before the permission, the government will have to explain why bajri was necessary in construction activities. Why construction cannot be possible without bajri?

The Supreme Court had cancelled 82 licences for sand mining last year. It had said that without environment clearance and study report mining cannot be allowed.

Meanwhile, a meeting at the Environment assessment committee of the ministry of environment  discussed the river replenishment study on Monday. Now, the officials of the department of mining are waiting for the minutes of the meeting before planning their next plan of action, said the sources  even as the real estate sector and other works related to infrastructure are getting affected because of shortage of of bajri in the state .

However , officials informed that provision of short term permit ( STP) has already been made , specially for the government, semi-government and DLB projects so that the development works don’t stop. However , this provision is not for private builders.

As such the  real estate sector and the other infrastructure related works will now have to wait for one and half month more as the Supreme Court on Monday set the next date of hearing in the ban on sand mining case after six weeks.

Sources , however informed that this ban is having impact on  construction of houses under CM Janwas yojana, many other residential housing projects of builders, Metro related works , many projects of JDA and all other big and small projects . All these projects are needing sand for construction work which is not available due to the ban on sand mining .

Officials 

Sources informed that officials may now start considering options like crusher dust which is used in some states in the country as an option of sand. 

The ban was imposed by SC on sand mining in the month of November and since than sand is not available for construction works .