Locals claim that illegal mining industry is rapidly gulping landmasses, which were earlier fertile territories.
Long stretches of fertile paddy fields in villages of Navelim-Kudnem-Sankhalim in North Goa, have turned into big dusty grounds with piles of iron ore stocked on it.
Locals here claim that illegal mining industry is rapidly gulping landmasses, which were earlier fertile territories.
Farming is slowly turning into a unviable profession and farmers are becoming businessmen overnight. The mining industry is increasingly using these plots to stock the extracted ore, which is later transported illegally through built jetties on Mandovi river.
The lands have converted from fertile fields to iron ore stock yards overnight and environmentalists point out that every year more landmass is being converted illegally.
State Mines and Geology Department figures procured under Right to Information (RTI) by environmentalists claim that there are only 15 plots registered with the department to be used for ore-stocking.
But the reality is different.
"There are several hundred plots which have come up in this area since last seven years," local Congress legislator Pratap Gawas told PTI.
Gawas alleged that there is a nexus between local panchayats and plot owners.
"Its for panchayats to stop this abuse of land but they don't act. We checked the records but panchayats have not given any NOC for such a use of land," he said.
These plots usually are situated outside the mining lease so that any illegally extracted ore can be dumped here.
According to renowned environmentalist Ramesh Gawas these plots are also being used to set up machines which crush lumps of ore into fines.
"Authorities like Mines and Geology department, Goa State Pollution Control Board or Town and Country planning department should have acted against these illegalities but they are being given protection," Gawas said.
Whats worse is that mine owners in connivance with locals have turned the banks of Mandovi river into godown for iron ore stocking.
"Almost 25-kilometer-long stretch of Mandovi River has ore piled on its bank. The ore is washed into the river silting it and polluting it," Gawas said.
Locals here claim that mining dumps were never allowed till China boom emerged.
"It was somewhere in 2005-06 when there was a mad demand for empty plots from the mine owners," Gajanan Gaonkar, an elderly from Navelim village said.
"Initially, the barren lands were being used to dump the ore. We thought that it is temporary phenomenon. But later people began giving up their fields for stocking the ore," Gaonkar said adding that farmers turned into businessmen overnight.
"The mine companies were paying hefty sums to allow the ore to be stocked," he recalls.
Environmentalist Gawas said that due to huge availability of illegal ore, the illegal jetties also surfaced on Mandovi river bank.
"There are four to five jetties which have come up illegally and operating. No authorities are acting against them. These jetties are one of the main gateways for illegal ore transportation," he said.
Goa has 90 mining leases and state exports 54 million metric tonnes of iron ore annually.
The Central government-appointed Justice MB Shah Commission is inquiring into the illegal iron ore trade, which is pegged somewhere aroud Rs1,200-10,000 crore.
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