Date | April 09, 2017:

The Goa government has decided to adopt a carrot-and-stick approach to curb illegal extraction of mines.

The Goa Mines and Geology department announced that those informing about illegalities in extraction of mines would be rewarded while those indulging in unfair and accident prone transportation of ore would be punished.

Goa had witnessed a total ban on iron ore extraction after union government constituted M B Shah Commission pointed out at largescale illegalities in this trade.

The department, which is busy reviving the iron ore exports after two-and-half year long ban which was lifted in 2014, has now said that they will reward any mining firm who will point out the illegalities committed by fellow lease holder.

"If the lease holder reports the illegalities of another lessee, the person or the firm will be rewarded. And the one who is indulging in illegalities will be punished by reducing the iron ore extraction limit allotted to him," Director of Mines and Geology Prasanna Acharya said.

In a step to control accidental deaths caused by trucks which transport the ore, the department said "in case of accidental death involving the truck carrying ore, the production quota of the firm whose commodity (ore) it is carrying would be reduced up to one lakh ton per year." Goa currently has a ceiling to export 20 million tons of ore which is extracted through 80-odd mining leases.

"We are going for zero tolerance towards accidents in the mining belt. Not even a single death due to reckless driving by trucks carrying ore would be tolerated," Acharya said.

(Source: http://www.dnaindia.com/)