The Rs 7,028-crore master plan drawn by the Centre to rehabilitate two lakh victims of a raging underground fire in Jharia coalfield has been launched last week with the allotment of over 200 new flats at Belgarhia in Baliapur, about 10 km awayf from the fire-ravaged spot.
Divisional Commissioner, North Chotanagpur AK Pandey who is also the chairman of the Jharia Rehabilitation and Development Authority (JRDA), the implementing agency for the plan, distributed allotment orders and keys of the flats to 216 non-BCCL families of Bokapahari, Rajput Bustee, Gwalapatti, Luj pit, Sudamdih Colliery, Naya Dhauda, Kukurtopa and Khairakanal. They had been identified as illegal settlers by BCCL.
Sources at BCCL said about a lakh families would be shifted in phases from the affected areas of Jharia coalfield region. The master plan will be completed within 12 years.
BCCL will spend Rs 2,311 crore on firefighting. Rs 4,780 crore will be spent on rehabilitation, Rs 1,068 crore has been earmarked for 44,000 BCCL families and the balance will be spent on 54,000 non-BCCL people.
JRDA will undertake rehabilitation of illegal settlers while BCCL will rehabilitate its employees living in and around the fire zones.
According to master plan a 40-sqm flat will be allotted to every authorised family. Families who do not want to avail flats will be given a 100-sqm plot. Every unauthorised family will get a 27-sqm flat. Rs 10,000 will be provided to each family as transport charges.
The affected families will be given a minimum of 500-day wage for two years as compensation for loss of income.
It may be mentioned that the underground fire in the Jharia coalfield is raging for the last one century.
The Centre had drawn up the master plan in 1999 which subsequently was revised on the basis of a PIL filed in the same year.
The office of the director general of mines & safety had submitted its report to the Centre in 2006, stating that there was no technology to fight fire on such a large scale and rehabilitation was the only long-term solution.
