Mines, Minerals and People (MM&P), a national alliance of mining affected communities, organised a meeting here on November 3 and 4 last to discuss the transformations in mining law, benefit sharing and illegal mining.
Minerals are non-renewable and these got developed due to natural processes over thousands of years but the current development and exploitation of minerals has not thought about our future generations. Even if mining has to continue with minimised impacts and rationalisation of legal mining, the Government has to ensure future generations get benefited from it which has also been stated by the Supreme Court. The Government must now think about safeguarding the rights of future generations and conduct mining in a transparent manner as any loss to the mineral asset will only make the future of next generations weak and put them into a vicious cycle of resource crunch without any reparation.
The meeting demanded that the Government recognize that it is merely a custodian and particularly in Schedule V areas has no right to hand over the natural resources in favour of the corporates. The meeting favoured the existing situation of Niyamgiri where Gram Sabha refused to give consent to mining and condemned any action to subvert the situation.
The pittance in the name of PMKKY is eyewash and we need community’s command and control over all natural resources and enabling mineral wealth for future generations. The defaulting companies should not be permitted to mine which were identified by Shah Commission as practicing illegal mining and the whole amount assessed (scam) should be recovered at first place, the speakers opined.