Mining tussle

Jairam Ramesh, Minister for Environment and Forests, at a press conference on environmental impact assessments and forest clearances, in New Delhi in March.-RAMESH SHARMA

MINING for important minerals is a major thrust area in the drive to sustain the proposed 8 per cent growth rate in the next 10 years. This, however, has led to a bitter tussle between the Coal and Power Ministries and the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) over mining rights in the dense forests of Indian tribal lands.

It is an old story of conflict between two power groups in the Union government. While the MoEF seeks more regulations in privatised mining in the light of large-scale illegal mining across India, which causes environmental hazards, the Coal and Mines Ministries seek fewer regulations in order to boost the economy over the next 10 years. Each side has its own economic logic.

The Coal Ministry has stated that the production of coal should be doubled in 10 years to sustain the growing manufacturing sector. Around 70 per cent of India's power supply comes from coal. According to the Ministry's official estimates, a sustainable growth rate of 8 per cent over 10 years will require the production of 90,000 megawatts of thermal power. To reach this target, the Ministry plans to open another 500 coal mines, in addition to the existing 600 running coal mines, over the next 10 years.

Since the 1990s, when the Indian economy started opening up, the Coal Ministry has been allocating coal blocks to companies. The idea is that the companies, which might be producing different products, will meet their power requirements by mining coal. It works like this: a company chooses a coal block and gives in an application to the Ministry to mine there. This is called linkage, following which the Coal Ministry allocates mining rights to the company after getting an environmental clearance from the MoEF.

The practice got a jolt when the MoEF released the first set in a series of maps of coalfields superimposed over forests on its website, identifying go' and no-go' zones for mining. It showed 35 per cent of the area of nine coalfields in six States, including Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Orissa, as no go. These areas are mostly dense forests where mining is unviable because of the environmental damage it would cause. The remaining 65 per cent of the coalfields are in forests that can be mined, but only if environmental and forest clearances are obtained. This has led to the cancellation of many proposed mining areas by the Coal Ministry. There are some no-go' areas where the Coal Ministry had already allocated coal blocks to some companies.

This has led to a furore in the Union government. Minister for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh has been under severe criticism both from the Coal Ministry and from the companies that seek to benefit from mining in the no-go areas. Jairam Ramesh says his Ministry is only trying to balance conservation and development.

The mapping of coalfields, a joint exercise of the MoEF and the Coal Ministry, continues despite the spat. However, Jairam Ramesh, stung by the criticism, has left it to the Prime Minister to take a final decision on the go and no-go areas. Though he initially stood his ground against the other Ministries, the MoEF seems increasingly pushed to a corner following the PMO's intervention.

The MoEF had arrived at its formula through some empirical surveys that computed weighted forest cover (WFC). The Ministry has suggested that areas that have a WFC higher than 10 per cent would be Category A, and an application for forest clearance will not be entertained in such areas. The remaining areas will be in Category B. These will be open to applications for mining, which will be evaluated under the Forest (Conservation) Act, with the condition that the areas should not form part of any national park, wildlife sanctuary or important wildlife corridor and should not be an island of disturbance in an otherwise unfragmented landscape.

Steel, power and cement projects linked to coal blocks have been hit by the move: an estimated 267 billion tonnes of coal reserves are under dense forests (now in no-go zones). The Power and Coal Ministries have been protesting with the PMO. If the 8 per cent growth projected by the Prime Minister is to be achieved, they argue, these mines must be unlocked.

These Ministries had been banking heavily on the proposed ultra mega power projects (UMPPs) of 4,000 MW to meet the power crisis through these mines. The Eleventh Five Year Plan had made recommendations to meet an additional power production target of 78,577 MW by 2012 through these UMPPs. So far, a generation capacity of only 23,000 MW has been added in the current Plan period. Total coal production in 2009-2010 was 532 million tonnes against a demand of 604 million tonnes.

Hasdeo-Arand in northern Chhattisgarh is the region most severely hit as a result of being declared a no-go zone. The coal blocks there were supposed to support 20 steel, power and cement projects. The coalfield has five billion tonnes of coal reserves; 18 blocks in it with a projected capacity of 120 million tonnes per annum can support a thermal production of 20,000 MW.

Union Coal Minister Shri Prakash Jaiswal said mining these coal blocks was vital for meeting the current Plan target. The governments of Gujarat and Chhattisgarh have supported his stand and have been urging the Prime Minister to intervene.

The Coal and Power Ministries have been pushing for open-cast mining, which allows the maximum exploitation (85 to 90 per cent) of reserves as opposed to underground mining (10-20 per cent), but leads to degradation of the land and forest. The Ministries of Steel, Mining, Road Transport and Defence have also complained that their projects are being delayed because of the MoEF's stance.

Responding to these concerns, T.K.A Nair, Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, has written to the MoEF saying the PMO does not agree with the definition of no-go areas. In a subsequent meeting called by the PMO, the Coal Minister asked Jairam Ramesh to allow mining in another 30 per cent areas. The PMO said the no-go areas could be a breeding ground for naxalism and could cost the Central and State exchequers several thousand crores.

On May 21, Nair told MoEF officials that 48 per cent of the area in nine major coalfields fell in no-go areas, which is not agreeable. The implication of this categorisation is that about 619 million tonnes per annum of coal production capacity is getting affected, the PMO pointed out.

Unbroken forest is not a justified word for Hasdeo-Arand coalfields as these areas are surrounded by highways, irrigation projects and other economic activities. There is a need to review the approach to coal blocks in this coalfield as this includes more than five billion tonnes of coal reserves and the potential of 18 allocated blocks are estimated to be 120 MTPA, which could support thermal power generation capacity of 20,000 MW, the PMO told the MoEF.

The PMO also suggested that the MoEF relax the definitions of WFC and Gross Forest Cover (GFC) so that more coal blocks could be brought under Category B. It recommended measurements of the WFC and GFC that would make for 473 go areas against the 383 projected earlier. Similarly, 132 blocks should fall in Category A (no go) against the 222 projected earlier.

Jairam Ramesh, in a press statement on May 31, said that releasing more than 5 per cent dense forests could not be justified ecologically. However, in response to the PMO's suggestions, the MoEF said in a note that the suggested criteria would release two-thirds of the proposed coal blocks in relatively less problematic zones.

The MoEF requested other Ministries and project proponents to appreciate the spirit of the forest clearance guidelines, which were meant to conserve the remaining forest and natural habitats in the country and safeguard the water and soil resources on which millions of poor people depended for their existence.

In a letter to the PMO, the Ministry said, The MoEF is in active dialogue with the Ministries of Coal, Steel, Mining, Power, Irrigation, Road Transport and Defence, and issues of mutual concern are being reviewed regularly at highest levels and appropriate actions are being taken up by respective Ministries.

In a meeting on June 18 between the MoEF and the Coal Ministry, it was decided in principle to re-induct a representative from the latter in the Environmental Appraisal Committee (EAC). It was decided that the existing guidelines for exploratory boreholes in forest areas should be revisited.

Three pilot sites are to be taken up in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh to ascertain the impact of such exploration activities on the local flora and fauna. It was also decided that the Ministry of Coal would submit plans of coalfield areas superimposed with digitised maps of the forest cover to take a decision on go and no-go areas for coal exploitation. Both the parties agreed to expedite environmental clearance of coal projects.

Environmentalists have hailed the MoEF's formulations but they fear that such progressive steps might get undone by the pressure from commercial lobbies deeply engaged with other Ministries.

R. Sreedhar, a geologist working with the non-profit consortium Mines, Minerals and People, said the Coal Ministry had 99.5 per cent approvals. If you look at the minutes of the February meeting of the expert appraisal committee on thermal power and coal mine projects, you will see they take less than half an hour to approve a particular mining project. In such a context, we need a proper monitoring mechanism, for it is well known how much these mining projects ruin the environment and the local economy.

The agenda for the February 12-13 meeting accessed by Frontline clearly shows that 27 mining approvals had to be discussed in a day, and each of these took not more than half an hour. In such a context, the MoEF's strict recommendations would have provided better checks and balances, an area that has been long ignored. At present, the Ministry of Mines, too, faces strong opposition from the corporate lobbies against the new Mines and Minerals Bill (which does not account for coal mining), which proposes 26 per cent profit sharing by the companies with local communities.

In a recent meeting with the Ministry, the Federation of Indian Mineral Industries (FIMI) made its opposition to the Bill quite clear. It said the existing Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act of 1957 should be allowed to continue because the proposed piece of legislation was too stringent on the enforcement of sustainable mining conditions. Small mines, accounting for 90 per cent of the industry, would not be able to meet these conditions, it said. It also said that the taxation regime in the draft Act was too steep.

The provisions of cancellation of concession and the stringent penalties prescribed are too draconian and may be utilised for political reasons rather than in the interest of scientific mining, the minutes of the meeting quote FIMI officials as saying.

Amid all this conflict of interests, the government must realise that it is not the absence of mining in forest areas that breeds naxalism, as the PMO has said. On the contrary, indiscriminate and exploitative mining wins support for naxalites in tribal lands. At present, an estimated 1.64 lakh hectares of forest land has been diverted for mining. A system of checks is not only welcome but also necessary.