The Jabalpur Bench of Madhya Pradesh High Court on June 28 disposed of a PIL seeking a direction to stop illegal mining/operation of stone crushers.
The PIL has been filed by petitioners Ravishankar Dwivedi and Vishavanath Pandey with the prayer that the respondents be directed to stop illegal mining/operation of stone crushers being run by Jai Bajrang Stone Crusher (Private Respondent) without having any valid mining lease and without following the procedure prescribed under the MP Minor Mineral Rules, 1996.
The prayer has also been made to direct the state to take action against the private respondent as not only he is running a stone crusher illegally but also causing lot of pollution. Swapnil Ganguly, Deputy Advocate General, submitted that in response to the complaint/letter dated 23.11.2020 made by the Petitioners to the Commissioner, Rewa Division, Rewa, the same has been forwarded to Collector, Satna vide letter dated 01.12.2020 to conduct an inquiry and find out whether the private respondent is illegally running stone crusher without having any valid permit.
It is contended that since the complaint of the petitioner is already pending for consideration before the Collector, Satna, this writ petition may not be entertained.
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The Division Bench of Chief Justice Mohammad Rafiq and Justice Vijay Kumar Shukla while having regard to the submissions made by the parties and upon perusal of the record, directed Collector, Satna to inquire into the allegations made by the Petitioners that the Private Respondent does not have valid permission to run the stone crusher from the Mining Department inasmuch as also does not have the consent to operate from the M.P. Pollution Control Board.
The Court further directed Collector, Satna to decide the complaint of the Petitioners by passing a speaking order after providing the opportunity of hearing to the Petitioners and the Private Respondent within a period of two months from the date of copy of this order is produced before Collector, Satna.