Mining dumps outside lease area illegal: panel, counsel argues they’re legal
GERARD DE SOUZA
NEW DELHI: Mining dumps can be allowed outside the lease areas, contrary to what the Shah Commission report has said, but if one goes by the Shah Commission Report then we are all damned, Mukul Rohatgi senior counsel arguing on behalf of Sesa Goa told the Supreme Court on the seventh day of the Goa mining case hearing.
Addressing the court, Rohatgi, who limited his arguments to the issue of intergenerational equity, mining dumps and their legality as well as reclamation of exhausted mines, impressed upon the court that the mining dumps were legally outside the mining lease area.
Pointing to the Mines Act as well as other Acts, Rohatgi stressed that so long as the dumps were part of the approved mining plan that is placed before the Indian Bureau of Mines and later approved, they are legal.
The Shah Commission has held that all dumps that are outside the mining lease are illegal based on the Supreme Court case pertaining to mining in Karnataka that dumps have to be within the lease area. That judgement was on account of the fact that dumping was taking place in forest areas. In Goa, most of the dumping is on private lands, Rohatgi told the court.
He stressed that the mining lease give the lessee the power to mine from edge to edge of the lease and if that is the case, the dump must necessarily be outside the lease. The mine area is bigger than the mining lease area, he said.
“Because of this line in the Shah Commission Report we have all been damned,” he added.
“But you are yet to face any legal consequences,” Justice Patnaik said
“But because of this report all mining has been stopped. People are on the road, we can’t just allow people to be jobless,” Rohatgi said.
“We have not stopped, it is your government that has stopped (it),” Justice Patnaik said.
“But these court orders are above them all and even if this government lifts its orders the court orders are going to be in force,” the counsel said.
“Governments only respond to public opinion,” the court finally observed giving the example of the central government ordinance to allow convicted legislators to continue to hold onto their seats which has been held back because of public opinion.
Rohatgi also submitted that for sale of dumps, no fresh environmental clearances were required and only royalty needed to be paid on grounds
that in the granting of the first EC, the dumps were mentioned as part of the environment impact assessment (EIA) and further also as part of the mining plan.
The court was, however, of the view that it was for the central
government to decide whether an environmental clearance was required or not. “Removal of dumps may create fresh environmental problems,” Justice Patnaik observed.
The lawyer for Sesa Goa also sought to debunk the theory of fixed stock
saying that as technology improves the ‘known reserves’ have already gone up.
“We do not want the court to be prejudiced by the opinion that at current rates all the reserves are going to be exhausted in nine years. History has shown that this theory is flawed and as times goes, our known reserves are indeed found to be going up. Iron ore is in fact the
most abundant ore that is found in the earth’s crust,” Rohatgi submitted.
With regard to the cap on extraction of ore, he said that it would be best left to the ‘experts’ to decide, be it the Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad which was commissioned by the central government or National Environmental Engineering Research Institute, Nagpur which is commissioned by the state government.
“Let us look at both reports (of ISM and NEERI) and we shall give it to the CEC to find out,” the Court observed.
The day began with the concluding submissions of the Solicitor General Mohan Parasaran who submitted that the MoEF has ‘now woken up’ and that they would sincerely implement the directions to which the court said: “Till you have the machinery in place, all this (submissions of the MoEF) will remain on paper.”
“The state government has been given the main powers (to implement),” Parasaran said in response.
A day which saw lawyers of the mining companies rushing with stacks of legal documents and the court teasing the lawyers on whether they were on the ‘right’ side or not and about their prosperity, has also made it increasingly uncertain whether the Court will finish hearings before it breaks for Dusshera, after which, in the words of Justice Patnaik: “we do not know what will happen to this bench…”
If we allow export of 10 MT, 100 MT will be exported: SC
Counsel for Sesa Goa, Mukul Rohatgi, just prior to lunch sought that the court give permission on the already mined ore that is stocked at jetties to be exported on grounds that the monsoons were now over and that the ore was being weathered and flowing in to rivers and streams and further that they have contractual obligations with exporters worth millions of dollars.
“Till your lordships pronounce an order, (already) excavated ore should be allowed to be exported.
“If we give (permission) for 10 (metric tonnes), 100 will go,” Justice Fakir Mohammed Ibrahim Kalifulla observed.
