After series of huffing and puffing and talks of corruption and favouritism, the contentious issue of sand auction is all sent to settle down in Jharkhand. The new regime at the helm, while coming into full swing on the matter, has started cancelling the leased out balu ghats earlier and latest in this list are four from Ranchi district. The Government has also finalised how to go about the fresh auctioning.
Talking about plans of the Government, Mining Secretary Arun, who himself on Tuesday seized truckloads of sand illegally mined from Namkom area in Ranchi, told The Pioneer that the auctioning process was intended to complete sooner than later. “The Government is taking the matter seriously and we are clear in our plans. On Tuesday itself, we conducted a raid and have caught illegal sand being transported. An FIR has been filed against seven persons. On Wednesday, I will be holding meeting with the officials of Kolhan at Chaibasa to conduct auction as well as check illegal sand mining,” he said.
As per the plans laid out District administrations have been authorised to conduct auctions for sand ghats under their jurisdiction through panchayats. Thought it has been maintained that all the sand ghats in a district would not be put under hammer at one go. It has also been left to the districts to cancel all the previously allocated ghats and make a public notice through advertisement to initiate the fresh auctioning process.
“We want to complete fresh auctioning as soon as possible. However, auctioning would not take place in all the districts and throughout the State at a time but panchayat wise one by one. This would make the process smooth,” said the Secretary and added that 80 per cent of the revenue generated by sand auction would to the particular panchayat while the rest 20 per cent would be deposited in the State’s kitty. The erstwhile Hemant Soren Government had gone for open auctioning of sand ghats in at least four districts which has pushed price of the construction material unreasonably high.
Requesting anonymity, a Deputy Commissioner said that directions from the Government in this regard have been received and process for cancelations and fresh auction would be started within 15-20 days’ time. “We would hold a meeting of all senior officials and discuss ways to club panchayats after their identification and fix dates for auctioning. Some consultation from panchayat representatives would also take place,” said the DC.
At the same time, the process to issue environmental clearance to the allottees would also be started afresh. At present total seven proposals, all from Pakur, have been granted environmental clearance from the newly setup State level Environment Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA) and recommended for sand mining as per previous guideline.
“There are lots of proposal pending before the Authority. As we have not got any direction or information for fresh auctioning process the State level Expert Appraisal Committee (SEAC) is considering those. Anyway, the Authority is not concerned about fresh auctions and we would consider just the applications for mining coming before us,” said a senior official of the SEIAA. Technical experts of the Appraisal Committee granted final nod for mining after accessing environmental impact of a project at local level and evaluating the proposal which includes site inspection, if the Authority feels necessary.