Alirajpur (Madhya Pradesh): Taking the cases of non-recovery of penalties worth over Rs 68 crore for illegal mining seriously, Alirajpur collector Dr Abhay Bedekar has issued instructions to the sub-divisional officer (SDO) for information about the revenue recovery cases (RRC) under the Alirajpur district mineral department office.
It has been told in this letter that a total of 11 cases have been filed against various individuals and institutions, out of which a total of Rs 68,11,95,780 remains to be recovered for illegal mining.
This letter contains information regarding three illegal mining instances involving the same individual, Surpal Ajnar, a Congress leader, the first of which is for Rs 9,44,01,000, the second is worth Rs 16,72,29,000, and the third is worth Rs 1,94,14,350. The total overdue amount for the three cases stands at around Rs 28,10,44,350. It is being told that Surpal Ajnar, though a Congress leader, even in the BJP rule, the district mineral office has not been able to recover over Rs 28 crore from him for illegal mining.
According to detailed information available, illegal mining has taken place in the rural area of Jobat tehsil in Alirajpur district.
A PIL has also been submitted before the Indore Bench of Madhya Pradesh High Court by two social workers, villagers Jan Nahar Singh and Thakur Singh of Jobat Block, to recover a penalty of more than Rs 28 crore from Surpal Singh Ajnar. The letter from the collector's office and the PIL tell a lot about the non-recovery of penalties worth more than Rs 68 crore for illegal mining. The PIL shows that the ruling party and the accountable officers had turned a blind eye to recovery from illegal miners and even now the pace of recovery action against them is slow, that is why the social workers, and villagers have been forced to take High Court’s shelter.
In this petition, a plea has also been made to form a special investigation team at the government level and stop the continuously increasing illegal mining across the district.
These social workers have expressed their concern in the PIL that this illegal excavation has been done by digging deep pits on the green government land that was lying vacant. If this excavation had not been done on these various fertile lands, then the villagers would have done farming on them and their lives would have been affected. I would have happiness. But this did not happen, and a particular person achieved prosperity alone. This is constitutionally inexcusable in a democracy.
Besides, due to the non-recovery of crores of rupees as government revenue, the government and the public are suffering a huge loss. At the same time, the morale of those doing illegal excavation work is also high.
Other major mining defaulters
A notice has been issued to Virendra Singh Jadaun, a resident of Arera Colony, Bhopal, for the recovery of revenue dues of Rs 14,92,25,108. Apart from this, in two separate cases of revenue recovery, Kamal Singh Ajnar, a resident of Jobat, has been served notice of recovery of Rs 8,21,30,625 and Rs 28,06,24,500, respectively.
