Although deemed unsafe and with a mediocre quality of coal, many people see rat-hole mines as a treasure chest. Meghalaya and its catastrophic rat-hole mining incidents seem to not have an ending. The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has banned rat-hole mining in 2014, retaining the same ban in the year 2015. The reason for the ban was on the grounds that this practice is unscientific and unsafe not only to the workers but the environment as a whole. Sadly, with the incidents occurring in Meghalaya time and again, one can only say that the orders of the Tribunal have been widely violated without exception as illegal mining seems to be effectively carried out in many parts of the State especially in Jaintia Hills.
This takes me back to the Ksan mining incident which took place back in 2018 where 13 miners got trapped in a flooded illegal coal mine at Ksan in East Jaintia Hills District. Despite all seeming ingredients for a successful mission garnering even national media spotlight, there was only little success that was met with just two bodies recovered and the rest still trapped into what we can now say would be just skeletons remaining. In January this year too, six labourers died after a crane collapsed into the pit of a coal mine in East Jaintia Hills. Yet again, another tragedy struck Meghalaya on 31 May 2021, with five people trapped and feared dead after being stuck in an illegal coal mine in Umpleng, East Jaintia Hills. It wouldn’t be wrong to say that the home department as well as the minister concerned is not doing their job right.
For some people, especially poor workers, working in a rat-hole mine seems to be a last resort to be able to earn something to suffice themselves and if not themselves then their families. It is seen as an economic activity that will provide them with what is needed to afford the basics of life. As much as we would like to blame them for wanting to work under such dangerous situations, we must also understand that such people only do so for they have mouths to feed. It will not be wrong however, to state that we can somehow put the blame on the owners of the mines who know the dangers and risk involved but go on with it for the feel of the warmth of money in their pockets. What would also not be wrong to say would be the involvement of coal thieves and the involvement of local politicians and officials in dishonest dealings in coal. The amount of royalty they get from the illegal mining of coal surmounts and surpasses many other activities that are done through legal ways.
Although recently the Union Ministry of Coal has already set the ball rolling for scientific mining in Meghalaya, such incidences speak otherwise. As concerned citizens, we can therefore only question those in power, especially the home department as to what exactly is their way forward when it comes to this activity which has taken away many precious lives. Are the souls and lives of those innocent people lost not worthy enough for rat-hole mining to be deemed unfit and to be entirely and completely banned from the State?
Cordelia Sawian
Shillong – 793002
