Bokaro crackdown on illegal mining

DC Sunil Kumar (right) at the meeting. (Pankaj Singh)

Bokaro district administration, Central Coalfields Limited, railway authorities, mining and forest officials will jointly crack down on illegal coal miners from Friday.

Concerned over rampant illegal mining in Chas and Bermo subdivisions of Bokaro, from where tonnes of coal are smuggled out daily on dumpers, trucks and even passenger trains, the crackdown will focus on illegal miners and transporters alike.

On Wednesday, Bokaro deputy commissioner Sunil Kumar wrote to divisional railway manager of Dhanbad Sudhir Kumar, railway SP P.K. Srivastav, divisional railway manager of Adra A.K. Haldar, besides all general managers of CCL collieries in Bermo and Chas, informing them about the drive from Friday.

A meeting to discuss the crackdown also took place on Wednesday and was attended by Bermo subdivisional officer Anil Kumar, Bokaro district forest officer Kumar Manish Arvind, district mining officer Bhola Harijan, CCL and BCCL GMs besides senior district officials.

At the meeting, deputy commissioner Kumar expressed surprise that despite police drives to stop illegal mining, coal procured through unfair means could be seen being transported everyday, pointing to a well-entrenched nexus between police, forest and coal officials.

Kumar said despite repeated warnings, illegal coal mining was rampant at BCCL’s Chasnala colliery zones of Gauri Gram, Babudih, Sitanala, Dagbera and Dhobaia where illegal miners enter trenches as deep as 100 metres and as long as 400 metres, which he said should be filled with sand and mud to stop illegal quarrying.

Venting his ire on district mining officer Bhola Harijan, the deputy commissioner directed him to ensure that all illegal stone crushing and hard coke units running in the district were shut down.

Following talks with Bokaro SP Kuldeep Dwivedi, it was decided that surprise checks would be carried out on passenger trains from Dhanbad and headed towards Bengal.

He directed Bokaro DTO Vijay Kumar Gupta to visit Gomia and conduct surprise raids on trucks and coal dumpers to see to it that they were not loaded with illegal coal.