CUTTACK: The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has fixed August 1 to decide on recovery of Rs 53.80 lakh towards environmental compensation along with the cost of restitution and rehabilitation of forest land damaged due to illegal mining of morrum and soil by a private agency in Parjang Tehsil in Dhenkanal district.
The NGT’s East Zone bench in Kolkata was hearing on Thursday a petition seeking intervention against the illegal mining by the private party without any forest or environment clearance. Santanu Kumar Bhukta, a social worker of Talcher had filed the petition. The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) filed an affidavit along with the report of the joint inspection committee (JIC) constituted by the tribunal.
“As directed by the NGT, the process of recovery of the amount to the tune of Rs 20.30 lakh towards environmental compensation for degradation of land for illegal extraction of morrum and Rs 31 lakh towards cost of restitution of the forest land in addition to Rs 2.5 lakh for rehabilitating the forest by raising plantation therein, has been initiated,” the JIC report stated.
An objection affidavit to the affidavit submitted by the MoEF&CC was filed by the private agency. The petitioner’s counsel Sankar Prasad Pani appearing in virtual mode stated that he is unwell and therefore, is unable to argue the case. Taking note of it the Bench of B. Amit Sthalekar (judicial member) and Saibal Dasgupta (expert member) adjourned the matter to August 1.
The petitioner had alleged that illegal mining was ongoing by felling big sal trees in forest land. No action was taken by the district administration and divisional forest officer despite repeated complaints. The tehsildar was only collecting the royalty and penalty without taking any deterrent action like criminal prosecution to prevent further illegal mining.
After the JIC confirmed the illegal mining of government land including forest areas by the private agency the tribunal had to compute and report the environmental compensation along with the cost of restitution and rehabilitation of forest land for recovery on account of damage due to the illegal mining.
According to the JIC’s report forest areas spread over three-acre were damaged and 8,580 cubic metres of earth were removed in the process of illegal mining for morrum and soil. The JIC included District Collector (Dhenkanal), divisional forest officer (Dhenkanal), member secretary State Environment Impact Assessment Authority and senior scientist of Integrated Regional Office of MoEF & CC, Bhubaneswar.