The State Government would submit the physical verification report of 42 mines covering Keonjhar and Sundargarh districts soon to enable the Justice Shah Commission to complete its second and final report and submit the same to the Central Government pertaining to alleged mining scam in Odisha.
The Commission had submitted its 1,500 page first report to the Union Government on July 2 last. According Director of Mines Deepak Mohanty, the Shah Commission had allowed fresh physical verification of 42 mines as the respective lease holders had raised an objection to the Government’s method of mapping mines area by using Google map.
The State Government had set up five committees on the Commission’s direction for physical verification of boundaries of mines in question and so far physical verification process had been completed in all the mines except one. The Shah Commission had also asked to cover adjacent areas of leased mines while undertaking physical verification of actual mines.
Mohanty said that basing on the physical verification report, the preparation of map at the laboratory of the Odisha Remote Sensing Application Center here was prepared at the behest of the Commission. The lease holders have expressed their satisfaction over the preparation of the new maps of the mining areas, he said, adding that the final maps are being prepared basing on cadastral base with geo-reference.