SHIMLA:  Can police nab or challan poor innocent  Khachar(mule) or donkey  under the Mining Act? Police have rounded up as many as 19 mules in Kangra and Mandi  districts along with 242 vehicles involved in illegal mining in a weeklong special drive against the mining mafia.  

Apart from impounding 242 vehicles, Police have nabbed  19 mules involved in illegal mining-  nine mules from Mandi and 10 from Kangra- in a special anti-mining mafia drive launched from August 1 in the state.  

But what is the fate of poor mules and their walas?  Fishermen have their fishing rights, forest dwellers have their TD rights, but can't  these poor miners and their mules  have their mining rights?

Who will make policy for them? Industry department holds investors meet or talk about ease of doing business, but they never talk about bread and butter of these poor traditional Mulewalas.  

The police is clueless over whether or not they can detain mules in police stations without feeding them.  

But the police action against  19 innocent mules have raised questions over the plight of poor mules and their owners.  They live near the khads  and most of them come from the "Julah community". But they don't have  their mining rights as nobody talks about their welfare.

The "moneyed outsider" can run stone crushers on the mining sites and make wealth.  But these mulewalas live under constant fear  to fetch even a bag or two on  mules from the mining sites over which they hold the first right.  

Now, the police have no space left to park the impounded vehicles in police stations as all its available  space has been packed to capacity.

Nobody know about plight of poor mules and their walas. So much so that if the drive continues for another week or so, then police will have to impound the ceased vehicles either in the hired parking, that will need police security.

Or police will have to take the vehicles to the police lines or to its playgrounds in Droh academy or other such places, which are with the police, reveal the police personnel.   

The drive however has exposed the vast dimension of illegal mining in the state that has been flourishing under the nose of the mining department from Lahaul-Spiti to Una and from Chamba to Sirmaur.

While persons having political patronage flourish out of mining business, these poor mule-walas and their children and families  live in depravity as they used to be about decades ago.

These mulewalas run for cover as and when police launch its drive against the mining mafias, who always have better off.

The police personnel are under fire from the animal rights activists, who question police nabbing the innocent creatures,  mules (Khachar) under the drive.

The poor creatures are facing police wrath because these mules are being used  by the “Kacharwalas” to lift the sand from the khads to roadsides or construction sites in cases where the tractor or vehicle cannot go.

These mulewalas just make their both ends meet while catering to the local thakedars or so under constant fear. 

All the criminal laws and mining laws are silent on “use  or involvement of animals  in illegal mining” by the operators, who by profession live in a lower rung of the society.

The mules are being used for illegal mining by traditional miners. The miners should have been given the special rights for the mining in the khads where they live for decades, feeding their families from the income they earn from the mining.

In the absence of the policy, mules are used because these creatures operate silently while trucks, tractors make noise getting attention of the public or police.

The police have not put it on record whether  the mule-owner were caught or not,  or whether mules were released or not.

All in all, during this drive Police have recovered a fine of Rs 19.10 lakh in a week time, which is an all-time high even in comparison with what was collected in the entire year in the past. Out of 322 cases  police compounded 295 cases in this special drive.  

Interestingly, as per the police data on the special drive revealed to media here today, police recovered a fine of Rs 2.85 lakh in 23 cases in BBN, ceasing 4 vehicles.

In contrast in Mandi, home district of Chief Minister, the police, however, recovered a fine of Rs 1.11 Lakh in 49 cases of illegal mining after the police ceased 33 vehicles- 22 tippers, 10 tractors, one pickup and nine mules.   

But the police are patting their backs by recovering an all time fine. But the police have chosen to be elusive about the plight of mules being used in illegal mining.  

The fine from compounding of 92 case of illegal mining was Rs 5.06 lakh in 2013 and it was Rs 7.35 lakh in 2021 in 135 cases.   

The Police have recommended five cases to the ED  involving a property worth Rs 5.73 Crore for further action.  The mulewalas  have their own mining rights. These traditional miners should be identified and they should be allotted the mining sites by the industry department.