‘Judgment reverts control of resources back to people’

PANAJI: Reacting to the apex court judgement, Goa Foundation, petitioner in the Supreme Court in the mining lease renewal case, on Wednesday said that it estimated Rs 65,000 crore losses to the state exchequer from illegal mining and that the Goa government should recover the amount. The NGO also called for chief minister Manohar Parrikar's resignation.
Goa Foundation director Claude Alvares said Wednesday's judgment in effect reverted absolute control over the mineral resources of Goa back into the hands of the state and its people. "If the people of Goa do not intervene now and take control of this mineral wealth in their interest and those of their children, nothing can ever help them," he said, adding that instead of prosecuting those involved in illegal mining and going in for auctions, the BJP government, led first by Manohar Parrikar and then Laxmikant Parsekar, renewed 88 mining leases.

"It is clear that multiple amounts are now recoverable under Section 21(5) of the MMDR Act. For example, Goa Foundation has estimated that Rs 65,058 crore (Rs 4.5 lakh per Goan) is conservatively recoverable for the period of illegal mining between November 22, 2007, and September 10, 2012," he said. Under environmental laws, there are numerous other illegalities and compensations to be paid for environmental damage, Alvares said.


"The Goa government must immediately ask for a freeze on all assets of all erstwhile mining leaseholders," he said. Alvares said since Parrikar masterminded and pushed the various decisions that the SC has found questionable enough to set aside, and since the apex court has clearly stated that the decisions to grant the renewals were taken to benefit mining leaseholders and not the Goans, it is time to ask whether the citizens of Goa were not badly let down by the actions of the chief minister.

Stating that it was wrong on the part of the CM to "favour the mafia controlling the mining sector in Goa", whose illegal mining activities had led to the closure of mining operations for nearly four years, Alvares said Parrikar should have known that "what he was doing was morally indefensible and politically wrong".

"When such decisions are found to be not just wrong and illegal, but done for the benefit of private interests, the message is clear: Parrikar should put in his papers," Alvares said.

He said that with the apex court finding the leases to be granted "for considerations that fly against the public interest and interests of the Goan community", it was time the SIT probing into the mining scam, also took up the complaint filed by Goa Foundation, first with the CBI and then with the vigilance department, asking for a probe into the grant of these leases.

"Once again the SC has shown that it remains the only bulwark for civil society against the distribution and pocketing of public resources by individuals and private companies, actively supported in this theft by the politicians of our time," he added.