NGT fiat to Telngana, AP for details

​New Delhi: The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has asked the governments of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh to submit details of sand mining done so far and on the quantities used for government purpose and for commercial purpose.

Hearing the arguments on the petition filed by RELA (an NGO), the NGT refused to permit the usage of machinery in sand mining as of now reserving its order.

Despite the repeated pleas of the AP government to permit desilting of the Prakasam Barrage on River Krishna, NGT questioned the former to explain the immediate reason for desilting proposal while the barrage had been neglected for all these years.

“Why did farmers' interests not draw your attention to the problem earlier? The bad maintenance of Prakasam Barrage's sluices is proof that farmers' are not the priority,” NGT said. The AP government submitted that it needed the sand for construction purpose as well as for free distribution and requested permission for mechanical operations.

As per Telangana government's plea to allow sand mining for construction of barrages, government buildings and for sale towards house constructions, the NGT ordered the details of the quantities mined so far and details of utilisation of the same.

Counsel for the petitioner Sravan Kumar argued that AP was draining and depleting ground water resources in the name of sand mining in Krishna river. As for Telangana, it was resorting to sand mining without having any barrages. He said machinery must not be allowed to be used at all by either governments.