Lessons from Bellary

The widespread illegal mining of iron ore in Bellary district of Karnataka has snowballed into a controversy which has the potential to threaten the future of the current Janata Dal(S)-BJP government. While politics will take its own course, the full dimensions of the phenomenon, revealed in a series of reports published in this paper through last week, underline several key areas which require urgent attention. A virtual parallel administration, complete with elaborate machinery to counterfeit permits and authorisations, has come up to enable the illegal mining. This parallel administration has to be dismantled and the credibility of the district administration restored, or else it will do long-term damage to Karnataka. The illegal mining of coal in eastern India has been a long-standing phenomenon and given rise to what is now known as the Dhanbad coal mafia. This has been one important element of the endemic lawlessness in Bihar. Long-term damage can still be contained in Karnataka because the illegal mining is no more than six years old. Unless the government acts quickly, Karnataka will become partially like Bihar.

The illegal mining in iron ore-rich Bellary has deprived the state administration of enormous revenues""Rs 3,000 crore in two years, according to the government's own estimates. Public utilities like roads have seriously deteriorated under the weight of heavy ore-laden trucks incessantly moving to the ports. The illegal mining, which has become almost a cottage industry, has played an important role in hastening the destruction of forests. The rampant mining, unfettered by any considerations of sustainability, has led to a severe deterioration of the environment with a pall of iron ore dust hanging over the key mining areas at all times. Through all this, Bellary has remained one of the poorest districts in the country with extremely low, virtually sub-Saharan, human development indicators. What needs doing is simple. Curb the illegal mining so that it is orderly and contained and hence will not be as environmentally destructive. The orderly growth of legal mining will generate large revenues, which can be used to both restore public utilities and also fight widespread poverty. Unless this is done, Karnataka will have even more of a split personality than it has now""with Bangalore and its environs pursuing progress and prosperity and around half a dozen districts remaining mired in extreme poverty, which puts them right at the bottom of the global league.

Authentic information on the full ramifications of the illegal mining is today available because the state administration conducted an elaborate inquiry headed by its top forest official. The irony is that the facts unearthed became so inconsistent with the ruling group's local political agenda that it began transferring key officials. It is at this stage that a legislator belonging to one of the ruling parties and a mine owner himself came out with a public allegation that the chief minister was actively involved in transferring a key police official who was part of the inquiry and in the thick of action against the illegal mining. For a country which has been grappling with the issue of securing the right to information, the lesson is that the government is a mine of information and transparency on its part and easy access to the information it holds are a must for any kind of improvement in governance.