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Mrudul Godbole
13-06-2010, 07:45 PM
Read this interesting article on mining in north east.

Mining the militarization: Coal tales from northeast

The story of coal in northeast India is an incomplete one. For 130 years, two governments, British India and Independent India, have managed the coalfield of Tinsukia district in upper Assam. Coal India Limited took over these coalfields after they were nationalized in 1973. Other than the Margherita coalfields in upper Assam, there is an uneasy silence about what has happened with the story of coal in other parts of the northeast.

Mining activities in the northeast are spread over a sizeable area of tribal land stretching across the states of Meghalaya, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh. Coal deposits are predominantly located in tribal states, and tribal communities involved in coal mining have deployed rat hole mining techniques for extraction. However, these days, earth excavators and dynamites make the job easier.

A coal contractor, Dilip from Tinsukia, claims, ‘‘This is scientific mining.’’ He feels that this will level all the mountains to make it easier for farmers to cultivate! Alemtemshi Jamir, the development commissioner of the Nagaland government, is a worried man. He observes that there are increasing numbers of reports about water poisoning due to the hazardous mining practices, and environmental degradation is irreversible.

The government’s attempt to ban illegal mining is a losing battle. S Jamir of the geology and mining department says that it is the tribal land-holding system that restricts the government from taking any action. He adds that his department is involved in exploring coal, but wherever they find it, villagers follow and start mining. Gogoi, who represents a big coal company from Jharkhand, says Nagaland CM Neiphiu Rio is aware of the coal mining activities. Rio is the first ever Nagaland CM to visit Tiru village in Mon district — and it was coal that took him there.

Reality contradicts the myth of the northeast as being a conflict-ridden region unsafe to invest in. James Ferguson, an anthropologist who works in Africa, notes how African countries like Angola and Sudan experienced impressive economic growth at the height of civil wars in the 1980s and 1990s. There is an ordered chaos that follows resource extraction anywhere in the world and India’s northeast is no exception.

Rights activists say chaos is a pretext to securitize the region in order to circumvent laws that protect the environment and ecology of the indigenous people.

Coalmines in tribal areas have attracted wealthy private companies from urban cities as far away as Mumbai, but these companies are often invisible because smaller companies, which are generally based in the region, carry out everyday operations. Therefore, the meaning of what constitutes a company can range from two persons on a motorcycle from Sibsagar, a group of five onion traders in Guwahati, or a brick kiln owner based in Dimapur.

As long as these front companies and agents can manage insurgent groups, government officials and landowners on whose land reserves of coal deposits are found, the operations go on smoothly. An agreement is signed with a landowner or several landowners and a royalty is paid for the coal. Coal mining activities are taking place in states which ostensibly have special constitutional provisions for protection of tribal land and identity.

In order to understand coal mining in the northeast, we must address how the region’s militarization has produced extremely weak systems of governance ill-equipped to prevent large-scale environmental degradation.

(The author is a doctoral candidate in anthropology at Stanford University)

Link - http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Home/Environment/Flora-Fauna/Mining-the-militarization-Coal-tales-from-northeast/articleshow/6012929.cms

Sabyasachi Patra
14-06-2010, 03:25 PM
I agree that there is a huge mafia exploiting our natural resources. To protect their narrow interests, they take the help of regional sentiments, extremists, maoists etc. The spoils are shared with the local leaders as well to keep their mouth shut. All the mineral rich states have such terrorist issues. Orissa, jhrakhand, chhatishgarh, north east states etc are reeling under the impact of maoists because there is a money to be made there. Unfortunately, this is happening under the garb of social justice and our so called intellectuals infact support such terror attacks.

We have to act soon, else, tomorrow may be too late.

Sabyasachi