Addressing the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of the parliament on Thursday, Minister for Industry, Mahesh Basnet made such an argument claiming it to be necessary for expediting rebuilding of demolished structures across the country."Earthquake has destroyed and damaged hundreds and thousands of houses and they need to be reconstructed at any cost. Though, conserving and protecting environmental and natural resources is important and thus cannot be neglected, the need for operating crusher companies has come up front," said Basnet.
Minister Basnet's proposal comes at a time when the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment and the MoFSC have been stressing on tightening existing policies on extraction, use and export of natural resources.
Government's preliminary assessment of earthquake damage claims that over 7, 00,000 houses and buildings have been damaged by the Gorkha earthquake and its aftershocks.
Tussle between the government and the crusher companies in regulating and abiding by operating guidelines has continued for years. Concerned over the uncontrolled and rampant mining of natural resources, a new set of standards in operating crusher companies was passed by the cabinet in July last year.
Out of 580 crusher companies operating across the country, only 32 companies had met these guidelines. Following failure to include all the companies, MoI had managed alternative areas for the crusher companies to operate. Though the plan had outlined 14 areas it nonetheless failed to include all the companies.
In addition to that, failure in connecting the areas with electricity and other physical infrastructure for the crusher industries to operate had drained down all the efforts.
Considering the scenario, Secretary at the Ministry of Forest and Soil Conservation (MoFSC), Shankar Prasad Adhikari, has recommended making specific amendments to crusher operating guidelines. He opined that the existing guidelines are vague and fail to streamline all the crusher companies into stringent guidelines, as envisioned.
"Are existing guidelines good enough to bring all the crusher companies under its ambit? Can these guidelines totally ensure the preservation of our natural resources?" asked Adhikari, stressing on the need to make timely changes to existing policy on operating crusher industries.
Existing standards provision that the crusher industries are required to be placed 500 meters away from highways, 500 meters away from riverside, 100 meters away from high-tension electricity grid and 2 km away from schools, colleges, health centers, hospitals, security installations, forests , national parks, human settlement and religious and archeological sites.
Related story
Operation of crusher plant in the name of fertiliser factory
