Illegal Riverbed Mining in Sukhnag River Beerwah

New Delhi October 5 : The National Green Tribunal -NGT has once again come heavily against the illegal riverbed mining in kashmir and this time the tribunal has constituted a high level committee who are directed to visit the Sukhang River in Beerwah Budgam and submit a factual report within 8 weeks on illegal riverbed mining taking place in Sail village of Beerwah and adjoining areas. On Friday October 4th 2024 the NGT’s Principal Bench of Justice Prakash Srivastava (Chairperson) , Justice A K Tyagi and dr Senthil A Veil (Expert Member) heard a petition filed by Dr Raja Muzaffar Bhat social and environmental activist wherein he had alleged that illegal riverbed in Sukhnag was causing environmental disaster plus destroying the aquatic life especially the trout fish

Advocate Saurabh Sharma who is the counsel for the petitioner in this case apprised the NGT principal bench with factual details and produced geotagged pictures of the heavy machines and dumpers extracting boulders from the Sukhnag Nallah in violation of J&K’s Minor Mineral Concession Rules 2016. The counsel for the petitioner also argued that due to halting of water flow in May this year more than 2000 fishes were dead in a nearby Trout Fish Farm owned by a local entrepreneur Peerzada Rayees and Govt didn’t took any action even as communication was made between SDM , Tehsildar and Fisheries department.

The Principal Bench headed by Justice Prakash Srivastava in its order directed for the constitution of a committee that will look into the facts and submit the report in eight weeks. The committee members include Member Secretary Central Pollution Control Board-CPCB New Delhi , representative from the Ministry of Environment Forest and Climate Change-MoEFCC , Jammu and Kashmir Pollution Control Committee and Director Fisheries JK Govt. “The Member Secretary J&K Pollution Control Committee will act as Nodal Agency in this case” reads the order

” While expressing satisfaction the petitioner Dr Raja Muzaffar Bhat thanked the NGT for taking cognizance of his case.
” In addition to environmental damages the people involved in the illegal mining were looting state exchequer as well because riverbed material worth Rs 20 to 25 lakhs was being looted daily from Sukhnag and not even Rs 25,000 are being deposited into the government treasury daily. Only a few crore rupees have been realized by the Geology & Mining Department and loot is on. The illegal work also violates J&K Minor Mineral Concession Rules 2016 ” he said

The matter is again listed for hearing on January 14th 2025 .