Following a Cabinet meeting held in the aftermath of the
tragic coal mine incident in the Umrangso area of Dima Hasao district earlier
this month that killed several workers, the government of Assam has initiated a
massive crackdown on illegal rat-hole coal mining in the state. More than a
dozen rat-hole mines were said to have been sealed so far but it’s a long way
to go before accomplishing the mission, as the area alone is home to at least 220
such illegal mines, according to Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma. The
fact that rat-hole mining continues unabated in the country, especially in the
Northeast, despite the ban imposed by the Supreme Court and the National Green
Tribunal (NGT) in view of the risk it poses to both human life and the
environment, portrays the authorities in a bad light. Either the government
officials are turning a blind eye to such activities or they are blind. There
is a good reason to smell a rat. It raises doubts about the seriousness of the
authorities in checking unregulated mining in the country and the possibility
of such activities being carried out with the connivance of officials, as
pointed out by the Supreme Court a few years ago. To effectively end illegal
practices, investigations should be initiated to find out the possible
official-trader nexus and penalise those involved. Arresting the workers can
help curb such activities temporarily but not end them, for the simple reason
that the poor and impoverished will return to the deadly rat holes to earn a
living as long as unscrupulous elements are allowed to operate illegal mining.
Repeated recurrence of rat-hole mining-related tragic
incidents in the Northeast region smacks of indifference, corruption and a lack
of political will to implement the ban on illegal mining. Several lives were
lost in Meghalaya in 2018 and 2021 after miners were trapped. A similar
incident took place in Ruchanyan village of Wokha district in Nagaland earlier
last year and now in Assam. Sadly, this may not be the last. In the absence of
stringent measures to stop the dangerous practice of extracting coal by
manually digging narrow holes, people will burrow at different locations until
struck by another tragedy. To avoid fatal mishaps, the central and state
governments should not repeat the mistake of focusing on treating the symptom
and not the cause. The government can also explore avenues to provide alternate
sources of income for the people, as there is an economic aspect to engaging in
illegal mining.
