Our country has abundant reserves of minerals like, iron, bauxite, coal and etc.. These deposits were created by a natural process over a period of several thousands of years. This is our natural wealth that is either being sold to business houses at throw away prices or being leased to these companies. This wealth gets concentrated in the hands of few and we the owners of this wealth get nothing. The companies who have bought or leased these resources sell the minerals in international markets at super profits.
It was mentioned earlier that companies that own mining lease for iron ore pay a meager
royalty of Rs. 27/tone to the government or let us say to us people. The same iron ore is sold at a price of Rs.6000/ per tone in the international markets. The expense incurred in extracting the ore and cleaning it up is only Rs.300/ per tone. Is this not a blatant loot of the countries natural resources?
The rate at which iron ore is being mined will soon deplete the country’s resources if they have already not done so. Goa exports large quantities of iron ore to Japan. It is said that this ore is of highest quality in the world but it has finished or will be exhausted very soon. In the same way iron ore of Beladila in Karnataka is supposed to be one of the best in the world. In last few years this iron ore was extracted at such an accelerated pace by the companies in connivance with the political leaders that it is said that within next twenty five years the deposits will be exhausted. This ore is being exported to China. Many countries are sitting over their deposits of iron ore waiting for the day when the other countries, like India have exhausted theirs.
It is evident that this wealth is not safe in the hands of political leaders and the government
bureaucrats.
Secondly, when permits are issued, for mining of the ores in any area then the people of that
area are displaced. Jharkand, Bihar and Orissa government have signed several memorandums of understanding with mining companies under which hundreds of thousand acre of land is being snatched from the tribal and handed over to these companies. In Orissa, Bihar and Jharkhand several areas have become battle grounds for the local population and the police.
This has given rise to the Naxal movement. The land belonging to tribal is being sold to mining companies at a pittance. While the companies owning the mines make obscene profits the locals of that land are faced with hunger, poverty. Their social fabric is being ripped apart.
Thirdly, the mining companies do not take care of the environment while extracting the ore.
They blatantly violate the environmental norms, the effect of which has to be borne by the
population that lives around the area. When complaints are made, the government officers take bribe from the mining companies and decide to overlook into the causes of the complaint.
When there is a leakage of any gas during the extraction of oil it can pose serious health hazards for the local inhabitants. In this small village near Ranchi where the ONGC was drilling for oil the people reported the leakage of methane gas ,not to the ONGC, because they, knew the Corporation would not bother, but to the District Collector. Though the Collector assured the locals that appropriate action would be taken, he also mentioned that it was nothing to be scared of, for there were cases where methane kept leaking from some of the functional oil wells. Methane is highly combustible and even the spark of a matchstick can cause fire and explosion in the atmosphere.
So we citizens have no control over the natural resources of the country, no control over the
naked loot of the mineral wealth and no control over the ever deteriorating environment.
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