Nellore: 3 teams formed to curb illegal mining

Nellore: The district administration has formed three special teams to curb illegal transportation of sand, silica and other rich minerals from the district. The teams have started imposing fines against violators and they had collected Rs 1.83 crore since January booking 306 cases against them.

The district has huge resources of silica, mica, gravel and quartz, sand and other minerals. Silica is abundantly available in Chillakur and Kota mandals as it is having huge demand in many other states because of its multiuse. Demand for silica has increased in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka as the builders have started using it as an alternative to the sand.

The district has 316 mines and of them only 119 are operational now. Because of huge demand in the market for silica and sand, some miners have started illegal transportation of the minerals from the district to other parts of the country. The situation became worst with the involvement of politicos who engage benami contractors for exploration of the minerals. The teams conducted searches on 60 silica mines against 80 in Kota and Chillakur mandals. They found that some people have exploited silica mineral crossing their boundaries.

They also noticed that they have been not paying royalty to the government and were transporting the mineral using fake bills. Consequently, special committees were formed with officials from the mining, revenue, irrigation, and pollution control board, groundwater departments for checking the irregularities. Further, the teams have sent their reports to the state government and started booking the cases against the violators.

The teams have been monitoring activities of illegal transportation on the Nellore-Chennai NH, Nellore-Tirupati highway, and Kota-Chillakur road keeping an eye on the activities.