Shillong, Sept 17: Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma on Friday questioned the previous Congress-led MUA for the delay in challenging the National Green Tribunal’s (NGT) ban on rat-hole coal mining in Meghalaya in 2014 in the Supreme Court (SC) within the allotted time given.
“It is the failure on the part of the previous government (Congress-led government) that when in 2014 there was a ban by the NGT (on coal mining), why didn’t they challenge it in the Supreme Court in the appointed time,” Sangma asked in the Assembly on Friday.
He said it is the present MDA government that challenged the NGT order banning coal mining in the State in Supreme Court. “And we got the order in our favour in 2019. Now, we are in the process of starting the scientific mining,” he said.
He also stated that the July 2019 order of Supreme Court is historic in nature because not only the land rights but even the minerals below it belong to the people of the State, which has been certified by the Supreme Court.
“This is the work on this government,” he remarked.
