Strengthen vigilance mechanism: Mines director

Patna: Mines and geology director, Manesh Kumar Meena, on Tuesday directed the department’s officials to strictly enforce existing rules for “effective control” on illegal mining and transportation, as well as unauthorised storage, to ensure proper atmosphere for scientific mining and increased revenue collection.He also asked them to actively coordinate with district administration and agencies, and stressed on strengthening the vigilance mechanism, use of information technology (IT) for monitoring, besides continued monitoring on the ground.“The scientific mining and exploitation of the resources with the overall aim to increase revenue collection by the department and strict enforcement of the existing laws and rules constitute the priorities of the department,” Meena said, after taking charge of his office, following the recent massive reshuffle of the IAS officers made by the govt.After taking charge of the department, he held a meeting with senior officials and others concerned and also sought details of the activities, including the status of various schemes. With respect to the new initiatives to be introduced, Meena said steps would be soon taken to conduct mining operations under good governance and to also make it transparent by using proper technological support system.While during the recent ministerial-level review of the department’s activities, it transpired that the revenue collection pertaining to the April-Nov period of current financial year had crossed the target fixed.

The department has also announced Rs10,000 reward for private citizens, if the confidential information on illegal mining, overloaded transportation and unauthorised storage passed on by them led to successful action against the culprits and seizure of vehicles and other items.Meena told the officials and other staff that the momentum of revenue collection should be maintained, and also asked them to do the work with team spirit. The culture of taking decisions within a time-frame, accountability and transparency should be the binding norms of work culture in the department.