NEW DELHI: Union environment ministry has come up with a set of guidelines that focuses on mandatory replenishment study of sand by using IT tools to track illegal mining and penalising buyers of illegally mined sand.
The document is prepared following directions issued by the National Green Tribunal.
The ministry said that it will serve as a guideline for collection of critical information for enforcement of the regulatory provisions and for effective monitoring of Sustainable Sand Mining Rules 2016.
However, environment experts differ and say that the ministry has put the entire onus on the states to enforce and monitor sustainable mining while completely relieving itself from any kind of responsibilities.
Environmental activist Vikrant Tongad called the 83-page document “idealistic” and said that the ministry needs to rework the guidelines after holding public consultations.
“The ministry should not have left the enforcement and monitoring completely on the states as it will suffer keeping in mind corruption and lack of seriousness in the state machinery,” he said.
“This is a major loophole as there is no mechanism in this document that who will enforce and monitor sustainable mining in bigger projects while states have been told to monitor for projects below 100 hectares,” Tongad added.
Guideline to generate revenue
Bhim Singh Rawat of SANDRP said there are some steps recommended in the guidelines like conducting replenishment studies and technology interventions that focus only on revenue from mining.