TEAM HERALD
teamherald@herald-goa.com
PANJIM: The Directorate of Mines and Geology has initiated a process to audit mining lease holders and traders in mineral ore in Goa, officials said, claiming that this is a bid to nail the illegalities in the last five years.
Notice has been issued to around 118 lease holders and 49 traders directing them to submit details on their mining operations by August 15. The details are sought for the period from 2007-08 till October 2012, when Supreme Court imposed the mining ban.
Details like production, export, purchase of ore, domestic sale, iron ore storage rather than at mining site, opening and closing stock, clearances from Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF), Indian Bureau of Mines (IBM), TC No, etc have been asked for.
The Department is in the process of empanelling a team of chartered accountants (CAs) or individual CAs for carrying out the exercise. A total of 26 applications have been received by the Department. The Department has empanelled four CAs, who would be carrying out audit in the first phase, on a trial basis.
Director of Mines Prasanna Acharya said that the process would be an appraisal of happening during the past five years; whether there were any lapses, or any shortfall in collection of royalty and other issues.
Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar had assured the Goa Assembly in July 2012 that a team of CAs would be engaged in conducting an audit of all ore export-related activities during the past five years. The need to conduct the exercise became important after iron ore exports touched 54 million metric tones for the financial year 2011-12, while the royalty paid was only for 47 million mt.
Justice MB Shah Commission pegged the loss of revenue to the government exchequer from the mining scam at Rs 35,000 crore.
