GURUGRAM: Taking suo-motu cognizance of a report on an Aravali hill being flattened by the mining mafia, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) last week issued notices to the Union environment ministry, pollution control boards, and district commissioners of Nuh and Bharatpur for their responses on the matter.
In its order on Jan 22, the NGT bench of chairperson Prakash Shrivastava and expert member Dr Afroz Ahmad said that the report raised “apprehensions” regarding widespread illegal mining. that culminated in the collapse of an Aravali hillock along the Haryana-Rajasthan border.
TOI had reported in Dec 2024 that officials of the Haryana mining department had carried out a survey and found fresh signs of stones being quarried from the protected hills in Nuh’s Rava village. According to their estimates, 6,000 metric tonnes of stones had been mined from the south Haryana district, and a hillock in Rava had been blown into pieces on the night of Dec 19.
NGT, in its order, cited a report and pointed to “mining mafia’s modus operandi” that involved carrying out a blast on the Rajasthan side of the Aravalis, where mining is allowed to “some extent”, and eventually encroaching “upon the hills of Haryana”.
The tribunal was referring to the problem of enforcing the ban on mining in Nuh, which shares its border with Rajasthan’s Bharatpur, where a similar prohibition is lacking.
“Over 8 crore metric tonnes worth of mining material spread across hills in Niharika, Chittora and Rava villages of Nuh disappeared. This marks the fourth incident in less than a year when mining mafia detonated a hillock in the protected Aravalis on the Haryana-Rajasthan border,” the tribunal noted.
Saying that the report “raises substantial issues related to compliance with environmental norms”, NGT said it “hereby impleads” member secretaries of Haryana State Pollution Control Board (HSPCB), Rajasthan State Pollution Control Board (RSPCB) and Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), along with officials of Union environment ministry’s regional offices in Chandigarh and Jaipur, and district magistrates of Bharatpur and Nuh.
“Notices are hereby issued to the above respondents, directing them to file their response/reply by way of affidavit at least one week before the next hearing date through e-filing,” the order read.
The case will be taken up next on May 5.
Asked about the tribunal’s direction, a senior HSPCB official said, “We haven’t received the order copy yet. We will act as per the directions.”
