​Bad tidings: On India’s quarries and mining

Sonbhadra is a name that indicates wealth and good tidings. As a part of a region straddling Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh — arguably India’s richest in terms of mineral resources though not in human development — this district in Uttar Pradesh is also India’s energy capital. It is home to some 6,000 MW of coal plant capacity — nearly half of all of Tamil Nadu’s. On Saturday, a stone quarry collapsed over nearly a dozen workers in Obra in the district. The death toll is mounting even as hopes are still alive that some may have survived. The State government has ordered a three-tier probe by the district administration, the police and the mining department. An FIR has been filed against the quarry owner alleging negligence of safety protocols. But if there were indeed violations, what was the government doing? State disaster response workers reached the site from Mirzapur, making a case for their local stationing in an area that has over a dozen stone quarries and other mines such as coal along the Vindhyas-Kaimur hill range. Questions have been raised about the level of safety training of workers and them having adequate safety gear.

But the problems are deeper and structural. Opposition allegations of rampant illegal quarrying are not fanciful stuff. Stone quarries represent the lowest end of mining, and often the least safety conscious. Stone quarry contractors are often small-time operators. Ideally, micro geological studies need to be done to plan the cutting. These studies will clearly flesh out the weak joints and fracture lines on hill slopes where cutting should be avoided. The government may do broad and general geological studies at the macro level before leasing the blocks. But once contracts are given out, micro studies, say at the square kilometre level, are rarely done by the individual contractors. It is just luck that there are not many more accidents, geologists point out. Blasting design is a science that accurately assesses the size and throw of explosives needed and, therefore, at what distance the explosives should be set off. But explosive size and distance are often just rule of thumb decisions. Such open mines need to be benched — small horizontal plateaus cut along the slope of a hill. This ensures safety and decreases chances of a wholesale quarry collapse, as in Obra. Investigators will need to find out to what extent these basic measures were followed not just at the site but across the region. Ironically enough, some of the best minds and technologies are available at IIT (ISM) Dhanbad. Whether there is political will to leverage them fully in the area is the bigger question.