Undermining mining

It must be hoped that the tragic deaths of 54 miners in an accident in a mine belonging to Bharat Coking Coal Ltd (BCCL), the third major accident in the Dhanbad region of Jharkhand, will focus attention on the neglected business of mine safety. India has a poor record here, with perhaps only China among the major producers having a worse record""and this points to systemic problems. In the latest instance, if reports are to be believed, stowing was not done properly in the mine, thereby leaving voids which must have allowed the accumulation of methane in a mine that has a history of being unusually gassy. Then, a power failure meant that the ventilation system had stopped, so the gas could not be pushed out of the mine and fresh air injected. In any case, the main fan house had leakage problems, so the pumping out of gases was not being done efficiently. If blasting is done in such conditions, an explosion is more or less guaranteed, and large-scale fatalities. And that is what happened. To call the culmination of such a sequence of events an accident is to mask the multiple failures that have occurred.

Some five engineers have been suspended, but surely the problem goes beyond their specific failure. It needs to be properly understood why BCCL has a worse safety record than others in the same business, including the private sector's Tata Steel (which also operates difficult mines) and perhaps the Andhra Pradesh government-owned Singareni Collieries. For a start, BCCL is a very troubled company. It faces a shortage of cash, so that workers don't get paid on time and annual investment budgets fall short of the minimum required, leading to an inevitable running down of capabilities. Investment in technological upgrade, which will enhance safety, is not made. The BCCI managing director has bluntly stated that unsafe mines cannot be closed down because the unions don't want it; they and the workers are scared that closure will lead to "voluntary" retirement. But it is also true that, in the last two years, Coal India (of which BCCL is a subsidiary) has not used half its budgetary allocation for safety and security. The irony is that coal mines were nationalised more than three decades ago in the belief that productivity, mining practices and safety would all improve.

But what of the agencies charged with supervising the mining companies? There is the directorate-general of mines safety (DGMS), and the Indian Bureau of Mines. If the managing director of BCCL cannot close down an unsafe mine because of trade union pressure, what about the DGMS? And is the Indian Bureau of Mines ensuring scientific mining practices? Conversations with those in the mining business suggest that these regulatory bodies do not have the best reputation for either efficiency or incorruptibility; nor have they expanded their staff and inspection/technical capabilities at a time when mining output has been increasing, and when state governments have been recommending the indiscriminate issue of mining licences to private parties. Clearly, the system as a whole needs careful scrutiny, followed by corrective action. More lives should not be lost out of neglect of the mining sector.