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MoEF Asks Coal Ministry to Check Coal Blocks in Dense Forests

To avoid clashes with the Coal Ministry over mining in forest areas, the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) has sent the draft of inviolate forest policy, that disallows any development or mining activity in dense forest areas, to the former to take views if any existing coal block falls in pristine forest area.

The MoEF is under immense pressure from the Coal Ministry to take a final call on the matter as at present mining projects in forest areas are cleared on case-to-case basis which is time consuming.

The idea of inviolate area was to identify dense forest area where no mining can take place while the rest is opened for development and other economic activities. “We have sent the draft inviolate policy to Coal Ministry for them to have a detailed look at the restricted forest areas. We don’t want any problem later where the coal ministry tells us that their mines are in inviolate area and now they want it be continued,” said a senior MoEF official, adding that inviolate policy has been prepared in consultation with all concerned ministries.

The concept of inviolate came after scrapping of no-go areas for mining, which was the brainchild of former Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh. The policy was shot down by a group of ministers (GoM) headed by former Finance Minister and now President Pranab Mukherjee following opposition from infrastructure ministries on ground that it will restrict more areas.

A committee was constituted by Cabinet Secretary which indicated six parameters for identification of inviolate areas -- forest type, forest cover, landscape integrity, biological richness, wildlife value and hydrological value. It was decided that any forest area that scores over 90 on a scale of 0-100 on all parameters would be restricted from mining.

Coal Minister Piyush Goyal has been regularly holding meetings with Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar to expedite clearances for projects.

Source: The New Indian Express