Shillong, Sept 18: The Meghalaya Democratic Alliance government said that it was committed to enact provisions of the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957 to prevent illegal mining and transportation of coal.
Chief minister Conrad K Sangma said for the first time, the provisions of the MMDR, Act have been enacted.
“Earlier, whenever such cases used to come in, there used to be only a police FIR lodged, and simple case was registered. But for the first time in our government, we ensure the MMDR provisions are enacted…(violation) of those provisions, a person can be imprisoned for five years,†he said.
During its sitting held recently, the National Green Tribunal committee headed by retired Justice BP Katakey has directed the Meghalaya police to conduct an inquiry into a video clipping related to alleged illegal transportation of coal in Ri-Bhoi district.
The NGT committee has also asked the government to punish officials involved in allowing over 461 trucks to illegally export coal to Bangladesh.
On this, the chief minister said, the state government as well as the district administrations has created various task forces in different locations to ensure such illegal activities do not take place.
“There could have been incidents…which may have slipped our notice, but whenever such situations happened, action is taken. Therefore, a lot of monitoring is going on, stringent laws have been implemented in many places, and checking is going on, which has reduced to a very large extent,†he said.
“If there are incidents, we are happy to follow it up, and we are very concerned about it ourselves. But as you know, in many situations there are laws that prohibits many other things, but activities do happen. But the laws are meant to catch those breaking the law and ensure actions are taken against them. That is what the government is doing,†the chief minister added.