How the environment ministry lets Coal India break the rules

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Editor's note: In 2017, as India faced a crisis due to the shortage of coal, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change offered a special concession to India’s coal mining sector. It allowed existing mines to expand their output by up to 40% without conducting a public hearing in affected areas.  At the time, many of India’s biggest coal mines—such as the Gevra mine in Chhattisgarh, India’s largest supplier of power-grade coal—were known to be causing air and water pollution in the areas around them and for flouting environmental safeguards.  Public hearings are avenues for local residents to raise concerns over pollution that could be caused or enhanced by the increase in coal output, and highlight violation of commitments made in the past by the coal miners.  So, in its 2017 order, the environment ministry said that only those coal mines that had managed to keep key pollutants in the mine area under permissible limits, satisfactorily complied with environmental safeguards and would not increase the land area of the mine would be given the special concession. Since then, 30 coal mines …