The Central Empowered Committee (CEC) of the Supreme Court has recommended a Rs 30,000-crore project to undertake environment conservation and socio-economic development in the three districts of Karnataka where rampant illegal mining has devastated the environment. It has finalised a plan for setting up a special purpose vehicle (SPV) to implement this.
In its latest report to the apex court on October 10, CEC has recommended for forming an SPV under the chairmanship of the chief secretary of Karnataka. The SPV will be registered under Section 25 of the Companies Act, 1956. The memorandum of association and articles of association would be placed before the Supreme Court for approval, it said.
The money received and retained from the miners out of the proceeds of e-auction, royalty, taxes, levies, compensation and penalty should be transferred to the proposed SPV. “The estimates of receipts receivable by the SPV have been made on the conservative side and the amounts that would be actually received would, in all probability, be much higher than Rs 30,000 crore,” CEC said in the report.
According to the estimates of CEC, the SPV is likely to receive Rs 2,897 crore during 2012-13 to implement the project, Rs 6,450 crore between 2013-18 and Rs 23,500 crore between 2018-44 to implement the project. In total, a sum of Rs 32,847 crore would be available in the next 30 years for implementing environment protection and conservation measures, CEC said.
“This money should be used exclusively for undertaking works which are related to socio-economic development, infrastructure, afforestation, bio-diversity among others in the mine ravaged districts of Bellary, Chitradurga and Tumkur,” CEC said.
The Supreme Court in its order dated September 28 had ordered setting up of the SPV. Subsequently, the CEC has finalised the structure of the SPV and broad outline of the works that may be undertaken by it. The scheme has been prepared on the assumption that the recommendations of the CEC regarding retention of the entire sale proceeds of the existing stock of Category C mining leases by the monitoring committee and the cancellation of these leases will be accepted.
The present system of retaining 10 per cent of the sale proceeds of the mineral would be continued.
The CEC has also recommended taking up the environment conservation works in three districts for a period of 30 years starting 2013-14 and the year 2043-44 would be the last year of the project. The current year, 2012-13, is considered the preparatory one for planning the project.
The Comprehensive Environment Plan for Mining Impact Zone for the areas surrounding the leases, will provide for mitigative measures in the impact zone and ameliorative measures for socio-economic and infrastructure development, forest and wildlife conservation.
