992 acres of virgin forest in Ballari’s Sandur are scheduled to be mined despite objections from the Forest Department, public protests, and a nearly three-year-old litigation that is still pending before the Karnataka High Court.
According to a study conducted by The Deccan Herald, in 2021, the Kudremukh Iron Ore Company (KIOCL) project, has gained attention as Union Heavy Industries and Steel Minister H D Kumaraswamy approved it. This approval effectively means that the mine may now be operationalized.
Activists told the Deccan Herald that development represents a further setback for the area devastated by mining and a sign that private interests have taken precedence over environmental preservation and public health.
Old growth forests that have not been affected by humans are known as virgin forest zones. Forest officials estimated that there were 99,000 trees on the 992 acres, including “300 types of medicinal plants,” after conducting a ground survey.
The Forest Department, from the Deputy Conservator of Forests to the Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (PCCF, Head of Forest Force), disapproved the request to dig up the mountainous forest region to mine iron and manganese ore between June 2019 and February 2020.
In fact, in August 2019, PCCF Punati Sridhar wrote to the government, urging them to “not consider fresh forest areas for mining purpose till detailed exercise is undertaken in the state for mapping the Mineral Resources within and outside forest area” and to give priority to the exploitation of minerals outside of forest areas due to the sheer scale of forest destruction.
According to Sridhar, the loss of the 992 acres of forest on the hill crest will have a detrimental impact on the area and seriously erode the soil. Of the 32,000 hectares of forest area in Sandur, about 8,000 hectares (20,000 acres) have already been leased out and opened up for the extraction of iron ore. He stated that it might not be wise to accept the diversion of such forests for mining at this time.
The project was recommended by the state government, despite the department’s objections. Given that there were other mining projects nearby, the Ministry of Environment, Forests, and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) decided to authorize the proposal since it “will be less imposing and less destructive” in 2022.
The Karnataka High Court lawsuit was still pending when the clearance was granted. The court started a case challenging the project’s in-principle approval. On July 29, 2021, a bench made up of A S Oka and N S Sanjay Gowda declared, “We make it clear that further steps taken on the basis of Annexures-A and A1 (stage 1 clearance) shall be subject to further orders passed in this petition.”
The KIOCL stated, alongside the new Kumaraswamy had confirmed, that issues had arisen from the company’s operationalization being delayed. He also tried to make it clear that the 90,000 trees would not be cut down all at once but rather gradually over the course of the following 50 years.
According to the KIOCL’s year-by-year land-use plan, the project’s first five years will include the removal of 21,259 trees on 293 acres. The company has been instructed to create a strategy for protecting the wildlife impacted by the tree-clearing operations. The company has committed to pay for the conversion of 1,984.63 acres of degraded land into a forest and has already contributed Rs 147 crore toward conservation.
Many people in Sandur, which was hardest hit by illegal mining for ten years, are against more mining operations. “The majority of our green space has been destroyed, and in its place are major health problems brought on by the pollution that the mining industry has left behind. Whether it’s legal or not, mining needs to end so that we can breathe,” Sandur campaigner Srishaila Aladahalli told the Deccan Herald.
Read more :-https://thelocaljournalist.com/mass-evacuation-efforts-continue-in-sikkim-amidst-landslide-devastation/
