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MoEF says coal is mineral, green tribunal slaps notice

National Green Tribunal (NGT) served notices on secretary, ministry of environment and forests, government of India among others for labeling coal as mineral instead of a bio-resource product. Notices were served by green panel while hearing a petition by Chhindwara's Iklehra village panchayat and village biodiversity management committee that challenged ministry's decision and demanded 2% royalty on coal mined from the area.

Tribunal has posted next hearing of the case for August 29. In its plea the village biodiversity committee and panchayat had challenged 2013 guideline issued by environment ministry to consider coal as a mineral and not a bio-resource. MoEF had it is letter to national biodiversity board asked to consider coal as a mineral.

Petitioners claimed environment ministry had no authority to rectify or amend the rules of Biological Diversity Act two years after the Act was enacted.

Quoting Biodiversity Act, Ikhlera committee claimed it is well within its rights to levy 2% royalty from the subsidiary by way of collecting fees from any person/company collecting a biological resource for commercial use from areas under its jurisdiction.

"MoEF is trying to mislead biodiversity board and public by quoting the definition of biological diversity, which applies to living organism," claimed Deepesh Joshi, counsel for village panchayat. "Under Section 2(C) of BDA, biological resources are defined as plants, animals and microorganisms."

Since coal is formed from plants naturally, it is a bio-resource, he said, adding coal companies do not even take permission from biodiversity management committees of villages before mining, which is mandatory. Biodiversity management committees are bodies formed at panchayat or municipality level under the Biodiversity Act.

Earlier in May, Ikhlera village panchayat had filed a petition with NGT, stating that since coal is a bio-resource, Western Coal Fields (WCL) should share part of its revenue. Following which, NGT had issued notices to WCL, Coal India Limited, national biodiversity board, the Union ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) and MP state bio-diversity board to seek clarification on whether coal is a bio-resource or a mineral.

In June 2013, board had asked three Coal India subsidiaries and one private captive miner, to explain why they were engaging in commercial mining of a "bio-resource" without its permission.

In addition, it asked these four companies to share 2% of their turnover with biodiversity committees under the provisions of the Biodiversity Act, 2002.

Source: The Times of India