Shillong, Nov. 3: Ram Shylla, 43, a coal labourer, was killed when the mine in which he was working caved in at Deinjem at Li-Iah village under Lad Rymbai in Jaintia Hills yesterday.

According to reports, Shylla, who hails from Mukhla village in the Jaintia Hills, died after he was engaged in rat-hole (unscientific) mining.

He was digging coal after entering the mines when the upper portion caved in, resulting to his suffocating to death.

Though several coal labourers die in various mines, these go unreported as coal mine owners refuse to file cases in police stations.

On August 24, a coal mine owner and two coal labourers died after they inhaled toxic gas while trying to extract coal from a coal mine at Siju in South Garo Hills.

Other reported cases of deaths of labourers in Garo Hills include the missing of around eight mine workers hailing from Goalpara in Assam after they were trapped in a coal mine at Rongsa Awe near Jadi gittam, South Garo Hills, in March 2009.

The mine had caved in, resulting in the tragedy.

Seven coal miners in Nangalbibra of South Garo Hills district were also killed on March 27, 2003.

They drowned when the mine they were working collapsed in Nangalbibra.

Again, in early part of 2002, 40 miners were killed in South Garo Hills and in the latter part of the same year six miners lost their lives in two separate incidents.

The state government is yet to come up with any regulations to check the unscientific methods employed in coal mining in many parts of the state.

The state mining and geology department had announced in the past that it was in the process of finalising the state’s mining policy to regulate unscientific mining of coal in Jaintia Hills and elsewhere in the state.

The deputy chief minister in charge of mining, Bindo Lanong, recently said the department was trying to include clauses which say that underground encroachment by any means to extract minerals underneath public roads or human habitations would not be allowed.