New Delhi: The Supreme Court today
agreed to hear a petition filed by villagers challenging
allotment of forest land for mining to French cement
manufacturing company Lafarge in Meghalaya.
A bench comprising Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan and
Justices R V Raveendran and J M Panchal referred the
petiion filed by Shella Action Committee formed by the tribals
of Shella village to the forest bench which would hear the
case tomorrow.
In their petition, mentioned by senior advocate P S
Narasimha, the villagers requested transfer of their PIL filed
before the Gauhati High Court in 2007 before the apex court to
hear it along with the main petition filed by the French
cement major.
On March 24, the Centre had approached the apex court
requesting that it vacate its stay on mining activities
carried out by Lafarge and contended that otherwise it would
affect diplomatic relations with Bangladesh.
Earlier, on February 5, a Special Forest Bench headed
by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan had stayed the mining
activities on the basis of the Ministry of Environment and
Forest (MoEF) report which said the company was extracting
minerals from the land in the forest area.
Prior to the stay, Lafarge was mining limestone at its
mines in Meghalaya for transporting the same to its cement
plant in Bangladesh in a 17-km-long conveyor belt.
The MoEF came to the conclusion that the permission
for extracting limestone, a key input for making cement, from
the region of Shella village in East Khasi Hills districts in
Meghalaya was obtained allegedly fraudulently by showing the
forest land as barren land.
On the basis of the MoEF`s finding, the apex court had
stayed all mining activities saying it cannot be permitted in
an eco-fragile area.
The 255-million dollar Lafarge Surma Cement project at
Chhatak, Sunamganj, in Bangladesh is wholly dependent on
limestone extracted from East Khasi Hills of Meghalaya.
-PTI
