AURANGABAD | March 20, 2017: The revenue department seized nearly 60 brass (more than 2.7 lakh kg) of illegally mined sand from the mafia on the outskirts of Osmanabad city off bypass road on Saturday evening.

The crackdown led to a chain of dramatic events during which the culprits gave a slip to the police before knocking down the official vehicle of revenue department authorities who were chasing them.

Police have booked Iliyas Shaikh and Akbar Shaikh, two brothers, in connection with the illegal sand-mining and its storage. Around 60 brass of sand was recovered from the site, making it one of the largest action against illegal sand-mining in the region.

Such was the volume of the sand confiscated that the truck roped in by the revenue department for transporting it to another place had to make 29 trips.

Osmanabad collector Prashant Narnavare said that the crackdown was part of a massive drive launched against illegal sand mining and dumping in the district.

Acting on a tip-off, a team of revenue department officials carried out a raid in outskirts of the city where large amounts of illegally mined sand was stocked. "No sooner did our team reach the spot, that the miscreants started running away in truck containers and one of the vehicles deliberately hit our official vehicle during the chase. The accused's later fled away by getting into a special utility vehicle," he said.

Narnavare said that sand mafias have been using newer modus operandi to exploit natural resources in the river bed.

"While official auctions are carried out for sand mining, the mafia challenged the allocation of sand belts in the court of law. As the is sub-judice, these elements steal the land and sell it illegally causing loss to the exchequer," he said.

Pankaj Deshmukh, superintendent of police for Osmanabad, said that nakabandi was imposed in the exit routes for nabbing the duo, but to no avail. "We have slapped IPC 353 (assault or criminal force to deter public servant from discharge of his duty) and IPC 307 (attempt to murder) against accuseds. Search teams also have been deployed for tracing them in the neighbouring districts," he said.

Revenue department authorities said that the government has vested more powers with the district collectors for carrying out effective crackdown against illegal sand mining. "One brass of land fetches government revenue in the range of Rs 10,000 to Rs 20,000 depending upon the quality," authorities said.

A section of miscreants engaged in large scale illegal sand mining allegedly also take the benefit of territorial confusion in the region with Karnataka states.

(Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/)