Destroying the Strata

The chief components of the environment – air, water and soil – are being destroyed rapidly in the mining regions of the Himalaya, particularly in Garhwal and Kumaon. The local people, labourers, as well as small contractors are being simultaneously exploited. There are no specific mining or environmental laws for the mountains. Even the general laws are not followed up here.

Open blasting, providing mining contracts to petty contractors in order to avoid labour problems, inadequate pollution control measures, provoking local gangsters to suppress or dilute local protests — all this has become common practice, Under such alarming conditions, no mineral should be mined in the mountains of Uttarakhand unless it is essential in the national interest. The fact that a quarry or mine yields profit to an industrialist and employment to a few people does not in itself make a national need.