7 booked for illegal sand mining, 3 held

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, August 12

The Amritsar rural police have booked seven persons, including a former woman sarpanch, in separate incidents on charges of illegal sand mining. Out of them, three were arrested for carrying illegal sand.

Those arrested were identified as Pardeep Singh, son of Dilbagh Singh of Ghoga village, Gurlal Singh, son of Mukhtar Singh, and Harmandeep Singh, son of Jaswinder Singh, both residents of Tanana village. The police confiscated three sand-laden tractor-trailers from their possession.

A case under Section 379, IPC, and Section 21 of the Mining Act was registered against them at the Lopoke police station here.

ASI Agyapal Singh said he was patrolling near Chaogwana bus stand when they received a tip-off that the accused used to ferry sand, illegally excavated from the river bed in the area.

Meanwhile, the Ajnala police have booked four persons, including former woman sarpanch of Sarangdev village, identified as Surjit Kaur. They were booked following a complaint lodged by the Mining Department.

Besides Surjit Kaur, the police booked Kuldip Singh of Sarangdev Khanwal village, Karnail Singh of Ballarwal and Bachan Singh of Ballarwal village.

Bhupinder Singh, mining officer of the Ajnala block, complained to the police that the accused were involved in digging up sand from their respective land in an illegal manner. The police have registered a case under Section 21 (1) of the Mining Act against them.

Illegal sand mining is rampant in the Ajnala, Lopoke and Ramdass area while the authorities have failed to nail the problem due to political patronage to the sand mafia, a local resident alleged.

People have been raising voice against such a practice and they say that nothing concrete has been done to deal sternly with the menace.