Days after Brahmchari Dayanand of Matri Sadan lodged a complaint, police have registered a case on Friday against 103 people, including owners of a stone crusher, for allegedly confining the team members of Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) and some seers of Matri Sadan when on November 9, they had gone to check whether unauthorised mining was going on in the Ganga riverbed. Angered by the incident, Swami Shivanand, the head of Matri Sadan, had slammed the district magistrate Haridwar and the BJP legislator from Rural Haridwar for conniving with illegal mining in the Ganga riverbed in defiance of the orders of the High Court, CPCB and National Green Tribunal.
Notably, on November 9, CPCB team members who were accompanied by some seers of Matri Sadan had been stopped from getting down from the vehicle they were on by some villagers and those working in the stone crushers. Persuasion having no impact on them, the officials had called up police.
The Pathri police station in-charge Gajendra Bahuguna and Kankhal police station in-charge Anuj Singh had rushed to the spot to rescue the officers from the clutches of the mob. Subsequently, a complaint had been lodged by Matri Sadan acting on which SSP Krishna Kumar V K had a case filed against the owners of ‘Ganesh’ stone crusher Gaurav Agarwal and Karan from Shahpur along with 100 others for disrupting the government work and holding the team back from doing its assigned task.
It is pertinent to mention here that the Central Pollution Control Board had passed an order on December 6 last, saying that no mining activity could be carried out in the five km radius of the Ganga riverbed because of the adverse impact it leaves on the environment. It had cited the EIA report released by the Union ministry of Environment in support of its order. The National Green Tribunal had too issued a similar order.
On the top of it, High Court Uttarakhand had also ordered shutting down of all the stone crushing plants and an embargo on mining activities in August this year. However, in September, the district administration had cleared decks for the resumption of the mining activity, a move that drew flaks from many, including the Matri Sadan head Swami Shivanand who had slammed the DM Deepak Rawat, alleging that he had buckled under pressure put by the BJP legislator Swami Yateeshwaranand.
Speaking to The Pioneer on Friday, Swami Shivanand said that the DM had given the administration’s nod for the resumption of the mining while using the report by Indian Institute of Soil and Water Conservation as a pretext. The seer cited the report of Dehradun- based Forest Research Institute to buttress his point. “As per the report, it takes three years to know the environmental impact since studies are to be conducted in phases- in pre- monsoon and post -monsoon periods. This means that the report made by soil and water conservation department in just three days on the damage done to environment by mining activities in the Ganga region is a sham,” he said.
Interestingly, the HC order dated August 24 for shutting the stone crushers had been revoked by the state principal secretary on October 16 and since then, mining has been going on in full swing in the Ganga riverbed, reducing to ridicule all the relevant orders from the court and other bodies and the concerns being expressed by the seers and the environmentalists besides the common people of the state.
Meanwhile, the fast undertaken by a disciple of Swami Shivanand Atmabodhanand against illegal mining has entered its 25th day on Friday.
No representative from the district administration has come to the ashram while the medical team from the district hospital was returned by the adamant seer.