Ramesh asks states to amend rules on mining minor minerals

In letters written to all chief ministers, Ramesh said "as there is no uniform framework to regulate the mining of minor minerals, my ministry has evolved a set of guidelines for their sustainable mining."

He said the guidelines were formulated on the basis of recommendations of a group constituted under the environment secretary last year as mining of minor minerals has been increasing over the years and was starting to have a significant adverse impact on our ecology.

A re-look on the classification of major and minor minerals, fixing minimum size of mine and minimum period of mine lease, a mandatory mine plan and rehabilitation of mined out area are among the suggestions made by the taskforce.

The task force suggested that the Mining Ministry along with the Bureau of Mines in consultation with the state governments re-examine the classification of minerals.
"The minerals should be classified into major and minor categories on the basis of their economic value instead of end-usage," says the report, according to a senior environment official.

It substantiated its view by pointing out that in cases of minor minerals like silica sand and limestone, the scale of mechanisation and production level was much higher than those of industrial mineral mines.Boulder, shingle, brick-earth, fuller''s earth, marble, stone used for making utensils, ordinary earth, road metal, line shell, kankar and limestone used in kilns for manufacture of lime used as building material are some of the minor minerals presently identified by the government.

The 16-member group has suggested that minimum size of mine lease should be five hectares and minimum period of mine lease should be five years, the official said.
"It is also recommended that mine plan, as in the case of major minerals, should be made mandatory for minor minerals as well.

"These should specifically include the provision for reclamation and rehabilitation of mined out area, progressive mine closure plan and post mine land use," the task force has said suggesting setting up of a separate corpus for the purpose.

In view of the environmental damage being caused by unregulated river bed mining of sand, buzari and boulders, it has advocated the need for identifying specific river stretches so as to ensure requisite safeguard measures.The panel, while favouring restricting of the mining depth to three metres, has said, "for carrying out mining in proximity to any bridge or embankment, appropriate safety zone should be worked out on case to case basis, taking into account the structural parameters, locational aspects."
Stressing that the recommendations would preserve ecology in a long-run, the Minister has asked the states to ensure that they are incorporated in the Mineral Concession Rules for Mining of Minor Minerals under Section 15 of the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957.