Ranchi: Principal Accountant General Indu Agarwal has revealed about the irregularities in allocation and management of sand mining in the state. The report said that Jharkhand State Sand Mining Policy was implemented in the year 2017. Under this, Jharkhand State Mineral Development Corporation (JSMDC) was entrusted with the responsibility of auctioning commercial sand ghats. A list of total 608 sand ghats was prepared in the state. In this, JSMDC started the process of operating 389 sand ghats. In this only 21 ghats could be operated. Due to delays in mining plans and environmental clearance, 368 ghats covering an area of ​​9,782 acres remained closed for years. This inaction caused a potential revenue loss of Rs 70.92 crore to the government.

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Apart from this, discrepancies ranging from Rs 82 lakh to Rs 7.61 crore were also found in the ownership amount to sand during 2019–22. According to the district survey report (year 2017-22), mining never took place in 14 sand ghats of Pakur, Dhanbad and Simdega. Its area was 129 hectares which increased to 172 hectares. But the storage of sand reduced from 51 lakh tonnes to 14 lakh tonnes. In such a situation, illegal mining cannot be ruled out. Such a large quantity of sand cannot flow. When JSMDC was given the responsibility of operating the sand ghat, they should have taken the help of an IT company along with GPS, CCTV cameras, stock yard in the sand carrying vehicles. This was not done.

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Loss of Rs 292.75 crore due to less mining

The Accountant General has said in his report that the state has suffered a loss of Rs 292.75 crore due to under-reporting of 93.53 lakh cubic meters in stone mining. It has been said in the report that when the mining lease allotment was investigated, it was found that nine applications for mining were issued allotment to the company on the same day or a day later. Many wrong information was also given in the application given for mining allotment. The lease area was overlapped at many places. The level of ground label water was also given wrong information.

According to the report, out of 74 cases of leases approved during the year 2009 and 2022, in the site inspection of 64, the prescribed documents were not even given to the applicants. Out of 120 mining plans, 65 mining plans were approved by non-nominated officials. In some parts of the mining area, mining is not to be done, but in 14 out of 25 cases, 83.87 lakh tonnes was raised from non-mined resources. Whereas only 53.21 lakh tonnes was earmarked for mining. Due to which illegal mining worth Rs 34.96 crore has taken place. Apart from this, in 14 out of 22 cases, the lessees have gone outside the mining area and mined in 15.14 hectares. For this, the team has investigated in Dhanbad, Pakad, Sahibganj, Palamu, Chatra, West Singhbhum. Out of 63 cases, the extent of mining area was not known in 46 cases, while in 30 cases there was no information about the extent. 74676 saplings were to be planted in 61 out of 63 plots. But only 2225 saplings were planted.

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