GOVERNMENT IS AT GREAT LOSS DUE TO ILLEGAL SAND MINING AND TRANSPORTATION
Despite closure of sand ghats in Bhojpur district till October this year, sand is being dug and transported with impunity allegedly right under the nose of the officials of the district administration and also greasing their palms. Sand is stolen at the ‘dharmkantas’ in the district but no action being taken in this regard boosting the morale of the sand mafias on one hand while on another hand, it also gnaws at lakh of rupees of the state exchequer per day.
GOVERNMENT IS AT GREAT LOSS DUE TO ILLEGAL SAND MINING AND TRANSPORTATION
27-AUG-ENG 4
RAJIV NAYAN AGRAWAL
ARA---------------------------Despite closure of sand ghats in Bhojpur district till October this year, sand is being dug and transported with impunity allegedly right under the nose of the officials of the district administration and also greasing their palms. Sand is stolen at the ‘dharmkantas’ in the district but no action being taken in this regard boosting the morale of the sand mafias on one hand while on another hand, it also gnaws at lakh of rupees of the state exchequer per day.
This illegal game is going on with impunity at almost all the dharmkantas including one at the Ojhawalia Mor under Piro police station in Bhojpur district.
According to the rules, if there is more sand on trucks or tractors, the dharmkanta operators kept the sand there and sell it to people at high prices. It the tractors are available with the dharmkanta operators, they load the sand from the trucks directly on the tractors and sell to the needy at expensive prices. Thus the businessmen benefit and the government suffers a lot of revenue loss. The situation is such that sand is taken out from the overloaded trucks at the dharmkantas and transports it on 14 to 16 wheelers trucks illegally to different parts of Uttar Pradesh and even within Bihar. But because of the measurement of the load by the automatic machines at the National Highways and slapped fine on the overloaded trucks. So the in the light of fixed load by the government, truckers sell extra sand at dharmkantas at cheap rate. Now the question arises whether administration monitors everywhere, how do trucks or tractors transport overloading sand too when the sand ghats are closed. Despite all these illegal business, how the administration is not aware of it and the needle of suspicion indicates raised towards the officials of police department and a big question mark is put on the role of district administration.
Thousands of trucks overloaded with sand ply to different parts of Uttar Pradesh and different districts of Bihar and the government is at great loss as it gets no revenue.
Due to the closure of the sand ghats, no revenue can be collected as per rules while illegal sand transportation continues indiscriminately in Bhojpur district. In addition to it, the environment is being adversely affected due to illegal sand mining and transportation. It also plays an important role in increasing pollution. While the administration is not able to curb such illegal and act of violation of rules, the morale of the sand mafias is very high and illegal mining and transportation continues in Bhojpur district.
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