Meghalaya: Body of one of trapped miners found, rescue operations underway
India | January 17, 2019 12:15 IST15 miners were trapped in a mine at Ksan village near Lyteiñ River in East Jaintia Hills district on 13th December, 2018.
15 miners were trapped in a mine at Ksan village near Lyteiñ River in East Jaintia Hills district on 13th December, 2018.
The Supreme Court has also rapped the Meghalaya government for failing to curb illegal mining and has asked it to file an affidavit.
The two-volume report released by social activists Agnes Kharshing, Amita Sangma, Angela Rangad, Michael N. Syiem and others has been submitted to the Supreme Court with a plea to consider it for hearing.
A team of a city-based company that specialises in submersible robotic inspections on Sunday joined the operation to rescue 15 miners trapped for a month now inside a flooded rat-hole coal mine in Meghalaya.
Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma, who was overseeing the entire operation, was also not alerted about the matter as it was "too sensitive", according to the official sources.
Earlier on Friday, the tribunal had imposed a fine of Rs 100 crore on the Meghalaya government for its failure to curb illegal mining in the state.
Twenty-five days on, the authorities have failed to find even a single trace of the trapped miners despite continuous efforts by the NDRF, Indian Navy and private organisations. Bu all is not lost.
The government told a bench comprising Justice A K Sikri and S Abdul Nazeer that the illegal mine was located near a river and seepage of water from the river was hindering the rescue operation.
The government told the apex court that the illegal mine was was located near a river and seepage of water was hindering the rescue operation.
A survivor of the accident had said on Saturday that there was no way the trapped miners would come out alive.
Rescue Operations spokesperson, Reginald Susngi, said that Odisha firefighters have drained out 7.20 lakh litres of water in six hours on Wednesday from an old shaft near the main one, where the miners are trapped.
Family members of at least seven trapped miners had already given up hope to rescue them alive and requested the government to retrieve the bodies for last rites.
The fate of the miners, who are trapped inside a flooded coalmine in Ksan village, about 130 from Meghalaya's capital Shillong, for the last 20 days still remains unknown.
On the 18th day of the operation, the Navy divers stayed inside the shaft for three hours with a hi-tech gadget, Under Water Remotely Operated Vehicle (UWROV), and found visibility to be very poor – only one foot, operation spokesperson R Susngi said.
According to Navy officials, the depth of water from the surface till the bottom of the pit was expected to be over 150 feet.
Sahib Ali, hailing from Assam's Chirang district, is one of the five men who narrowly escaped the flooding coal mine a fortnight ago.
The mine got flooded when water from the nearby Lytein river gushed into it on December 13, trapping the 15 diggers.
Superintendent of Police Sylvester Mongtynger said two teams from Kirloskar Brothers Ltd arrived on Thursday to help in rescuing the miners trapped in the 370-foot-deep illegal mine.
Rijiju also blamed the previous Congress government in Meghalaya for the "unsafe illegal minining activities" in the state.
Meghalaya govt has written to Coal India seeking their special pumps to aid the rescue of 15 miners in Lumthari area of East Jaintia Hills district.
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