When The State Squats Inside A National Park

Seven years after an SC ban, a PSU holds on to closed mining sites inside Kudremukh

Tehelka, 11 April, 2013

2002: Bhadra river at the peak of mining in 2002

On paper, it is an open-and-shut case. Kudremukh Iron Ore Company Ltd (KIOCL), a public sector undertaking (PSU), mined the rainforests of Kudremukh in Karnataka till 2005 when a ban on mining operations imposed by the Supreme Court came into effect. The company was ordered to remove its infrastructure and return the leased areas to the State for ecological restoration.

More than seven years later, KIOCL still holds on to 1,452 hectares and diverts water from deep inside the national park to its Mangalore plant. What’s more, the company now proposes to invest Rs 805 crore in this land to “develop an eco-town” with an 18-hole golf course, a helipad and facilities for adventure and water sports.

2010:  Recovery in 5  years since mining stopped in 2005

The story goes back to 1999 when KIOCL’s 25-year lease to mine a 4,605 hectare area in Kudremukh expired. The lease was not renewed, but the apex court allowed it to continue mining only in the already broken-up area of 1,452 hectares till 2005. Subsequently, the apex court rejected KIOCL’s review application and curative petition in November and December 2005, respectively.

The company exhausted its legal options in December 2006 when the Supreme Court categorically rejected its plea to continue mining under the pretext of stabilisation of slopes and directed the state to take possession of the mines and implement the mine closure plan with “no or minimal disturbance to the unbroken area”.

But KIOCL continues to occupy the land with its infrastructure intact. In fact, on 4 December 2009, Minister of State for Steel A Sai Prathap informed the Rajya Sabha that KIOCL was “incurring an expenditure of around Rs 60 crore per annum on Kudremukh site towards salary and other amenities of employees posted at Kudremukh, security of plant and machinery and for maintenance of plant and equipment at Kudremukh”.

If such expenditure of public money at a site where mining has long been banned for good appears inexplicable, the minister clarified that the government did not consider Kudremukh a closed chapter. In the same statement, he said, “Restarting of Kudremukh mining activities cannot be undertaken without specific clearance from the Hon’ble Supreme Court, hence no specific time frame can be fixed for reopening of the mine.”

Of the 4,605 hectares leased to KIOCL, 3,152 hectares are forestland and the rest belongs to the Revenue Department. Subsequently, the company illegally occupied another 550 hectares of forestland. In January 2007, Karnataka notified this 37 sq km of forestland as part of Kudremukh National Park.

Seven months on, the revenue secretary issued a note, stating that the state government, in principle, agreed to KIOCL’s request to change the purpose from mining to eco-tourism for utilising the revenue land leased to the company. He also offered to take up the eco-tourism project as a joint venture between the state and KIOCL and improve the infrastructure at, and the connectivity to, the project site.

The project did not take off immediately because KIOCL still expected to resume mining one way or the other. In August 2010, secretary to the Union steel ministry told the media at a KIOCL press meet that the government was planning to file a curative petition in the Supreme Court seeking to remove 24 million tonnes of iron ore from Kudremukh so that the monsoon run-off did not pollute the Bhadra river. Photographs of the river, taken in 2002 and 2010, show that it has recovered from the devastating impact of mining that had turned it red.

It is unclear if the law ministry discouraged the move because a curative petition had already been dismissed in 2005 and the apex court’s December 2006 judgment “noted that at various times, petitions have been filed practically with a view to undo what had been definitely held to be imperative by this court”, but the steel ministry shelved its plans.

However, the state government failed to evict KIOCL even after the then environment minister Jairam Ramesh wrote to chief minister BS Yeddyurappa in February 2011 to ensure removal of the company’s machinery and infrastructure from the terminated lease area.

With mining no more a likely option, KIOCL revived its Plan B to monetise the land. Celebrating the company’s 38th Foundation Day on 2 April, chairman and managing director Malay Chatterjee told the media about KIOCL’s plan to utilise the infrastructure created at Kudremukh in developing an eco-town. “It is necessary that the land lease be renewed for 99 years at the earliest in favour of KIOCL. We have prepared the detailed project report and got the in-principle nod from the Karnataka government. Investment of Rs 805 crore will be made in phases,” he told PTI.

The December 2006 Supreme Court order, however, had already dismissed KIOCL’s plea of conducting eco-tourism inside Kudremukh. The company’s lease expired in 1999 and, contrary to Chatterjee’s claim, cannot be renewed. Anyway, renewing the lease or issuing a fresh one for a luxury township inside the national park will violate the regulations of Ecologically Sensitive Zone laid down by the apex court.

“Due to massive devastation caused by mining over 30 years, the Kudremukh area now needs complete rest and urgent ecological restoration. This is also in the larger interest of securing river water for lakhs of farmers. It must not be subjected to any further pressure under the pretext of luxury eco-tourism and other commercial activities that violate the law and the orders of the Supreme Court,” says Praveen Bharghav of Wildlife First, the Bengaluru NGO that petitioned the Supreme Court, leading to the landmark October 2002 judgment and closure of mining in 2005.

While Dismissing the eco-city plan as legally untenable, Ullas Karanth, director, Centre for Wildlife Studies, points out the company’s dodgy track record: “Ten years ago, the Comptroller and Auditor General (and the Public Accounts Committee of the state Assembly) concluded that KIOCL caused environmental damage amounting to 139.15 crore. It is yet to pay up the fine. The company continues to illegally take water from Lakya dam (built to store iron ore tailing) to its Mangalore plant. These are not the standards a PSU sets for the industry.”

The CAG in its 2003 audit report noted that KIOCL had illegally opened up 56.28 hectares of Kudremukh National Park after expiry of the lease between 1999 and March 2002. The company also illegally raised the height of Lakya dam, submerging 340 hectares of forestland outside the lease area. While the requirement for its Mangalore plant can be met locally by treating the town’s wastewater, KIOCL illegally diverts water from a national park through a pipeline.

While nature is bouncing back even in the heavily mined areas of Kudremukh, the presence of the Lakya dam that had developed cracks in the past remains a worry.

“Illegal diversion of water must stop. All constructions, except a range office and maybe a research station, should be demolished from that pocket of revenue land. As long as KIOCL sits there, all sorts of interests — from commando schools to temple trusts — will eye that prime land,” warns Karanth.

Bharghav is emphatic: “Rejecting KIOCL’s tourism proposal is not enough. The state must also evict the company from its illegal possession of the 1,452 hectares of the lapsed mining lease area as failure to do so amounts to gross contempt of the Supreme Court order.”