SC cancels Goa mining leases Apex court order leaves Goa BJP govt redfaced
BLOW Existing leases will run till March 15, after which all mining activity has to stop; court directs setting up of SIT
NEWDELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday cancelled 88 iron ore mining leases in Goa, dealing a blow to miners including Vedanta Ltd.
The existing leases will run till 15 March, after which mining activity has to stop, the court directed.
The Supreme Court bench, headed by justice Madan B. Lokur, held the government’s process of renewing the mining leases of companies to be “in violation of law” and directed the state government to grant fresh licences through an auction.
The court also directed the setting up of a special investigation team that will include a chartered accountant to determine the charges to be levied on the mining companies whose leases were renewed in 2015.
Shares of Vedanta Ltd fell 1.96% to ₹315.35 on BSE, on a day the exchange’s benchmark Sensex dropped 0.33% to 34,082.71 points.
The Supreme Court was hearing a public interest litigation by the Goa Foundation. The petition had questioned the renewal of mining leases in the state.
The Goa Foundation, through its lawyer Prashant Bhushan, had argued that the state’s policy on renewing leases did not conform to the Supreme Court’s stand on optimum utilization of natural resources.
Bhushan contended that the state government ought to have auctioned the mining leases instead of renewing them.
He pointed out that the mines ordinance approved on 12 January 2015 did not spell out a renewal procedure. All renewals were done before the ordinance came into force, he said, with 31 leases being renewed on 12 January 2015.
The Mines and Minerals Amendment Bill was subsequently placed before Parliament and approved on 27 March 2015.
The Goa Foundation’s petition, a copy of which Mint has reviewed, alleged that miners and government authorities had colluded to circumvent not just the ordinance, but also the Supreme Court’s ruling of 21 April 2014. The renewal was against the court’s precedents laid down for the appropriate and optimum utilization of natural resources, the petition claimed.
According to the petition, 56 leases were renewed between 6 and 12 January 2015, shortly before the ordinance was passed.
The petition has named 20 miners whose leases have been renewed. Some of these companies had earlier moved the Bombay high court seeking to direct the Goa government to consider and grant a second renewal of mining leases.
It was on their petition that the Panaji bench of the Bombay high court had on 13 August 2014 directed the state government of Goa to execute a second renewal of leases in favour of companies that had paid the required stamp duty.
Last year, the Goa Foundation had appealed this decision before the Supreme Court; that case is also being heard in the current batch of cases. The appeal said that the order “disembodies the directions” of the court. MUMBAI: The apex court verdict that cancelled 88 mining leases, cleared in 2015, comes as an embarrassment to the Manohar Parrikar-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in Goa.
In 2015, the Goa government cleared second renewal for 88 mining leases for 20 years. The Goa Foundation, which challenged this decision, alleged that the renewals were illegal and came on the day (January 12) when the new ordinance was approved. The ordinance called for an auction of mining leases as opposed to renewals.
The decision to renew leases was seen as a turn around by the party because Parrikar as the Leader of Opposition had exposed the mining scam and led a campaign against the Congress. Even though Parrikar had moved to Delhi in 2014 and left Laxmikant Parsekar in charge when this decision was made, he continued to be seen as one who would call the shots.
While Parrikar remained unavailable for comment, he told IANS, “There is no panic. We can decide in two, three days. I have to also seek legal advice on the issue. As a chief minister, I cannot comment casually. The order is not applicable (from) tomorrow.”
Meanwhile, the Opposition trained guns on the CM. The Aam Admi Party called for a probe into the lease renewals and Congress demanded Parrikar’s resignation. “When Parrikar was the opposition leader and PAC chairman pre-2012, he came out with this bogus theory of 25,000 crore loss. Then as CM in 2012, he took a knee-jerk action of stopping mining in Goa. Even as late as September 2017, Parrikar said that Goa is no longer dependant on mining revenue. Since 2012 till date, Parrikar never reached out to stakeholders of mining nor did he get any package from the Centre which he promised for mining dependents in 2014 Lok Sabha election manifesto,” said Yatish Naik, spokesperson of Goa Congress.