Chief Minister Conrad Sangma today said that the environmental clearance received by Star Cement for its controversial limestone mining project in Brishyrnot, East Jaintia Hills, was all the central government’s doing and not that of the Meghalaya government.
Star Cement has proposed a new project on 42 hectares of land in Brishyrnot, close to the protected Narpuh Reserve Forest. This would threaten rare flora and fauna and further worsen conditions in the already polluted Lukha River, critics have said. Attempts to hold a public hearing on the subject have been foiled by strong protests by citizens and pressure groups on separate occasions.
“We had in fact written to the government of India stating that a number of times the public hearing was to be held but there was opposition and it could not be held,” the Chief Minister said.
The state government has sent a report to New Delhi on the number of landowners in support and opposed to the project.
“All these reports we have sent to the government of India, of every meeting that has taken place. We left the matter to the Centre to decide. We have tried our best,” Sangma said.
However, the Chief Minister said that he did not have any knowledge about the environmental clearance given to Star Cement, which was announced by the company in a public notice. The clearance, the firm said, was given on June 8 and a copy of it is held with the Meghalaya State Pollution Control Board.
“I don’t know about this thing… what the government of India has done. But we have given the report (to the Centre) as was mandated,” the CM stated, adding that, based on this, the central government has made its decision.
