Faridabad, May 10
The Supreme Court’s interim order to ban mining in the five km belt of the Delhi border has not only shocked the Haryana government, it has also dealt a stunning blow to thousands of workers in the area for whom it was a source of their two square meals.

The heavy investment in the infrastructure and development of the mining activities, reported to have cost over Rs 3,000 crore, is likely to go down the drain.

The region, a ‘goldmine’ for the state government, contributes about Rs 140 crore annually to the state exchequer.

The lease holders, transporters and suppliers of various machines and infrastructure for the work seem to be hit hard as it is reported that thousands of crores of rupees had been invested here. While the automatic and ultramodern machines like the JCBs, loaders, extractors and the dumper trucks have been used commonly in such a work, the investment in the machinery is quite heavy.

Thousands of trucks operating round the clock in transportation of the material and about 700 JCBs costing about Rs 100 crore have become useless. An amount of Rs 200 crore is reported to have been invested in ‘loaders’ alone. One loader costs about Rs 20 to Rs 24 lakh.

According to mining experts, a whopping Rs 1,500 crore had been invested in about 15,000 trucks as each of such vehicle costs about Rs 10 to Rs 15 lakhs.

Another Rs 100 crore is stated to be spent on the development of mining pits. There are over 100 such mine spots and each such spot require at least Rs 10 lakh for proper development, as per the mine-owners.

The Pali crusher zone which has about 175 crushers at present is likely to be hit severely, although the authorities say that the zone does not come under the purview of the court order. But these crushers depend mainly on the mines of the Aravalli Hills for the supply of raw material. As majority of the mines in the region have been closed down, the crushers are likely to come to a grinding halt.

It is learnt that setting up of a crusher cost around Rs 1.50 crore. The owners of the machines may find it difficult to return their instalments of the banks and other financial institutions from whom they had taken loan for purchasing the costly equipment.

The authorities have set up ‘nakas’ and patrolling round the clock to implement the order as the majority of the jobless labourers are going to be near the breadline.

A large number of hapless workers are migrants from other states and most of the truck drivers and machine operators belong to Anangpur, Bhadkhal, Pali, Pakhar, Mohabattabad and nearby areas.

Meanwhile, the rate of construction material like Badarpur sand, stone dust and Bajri have gone up by Rs 300 per truck due to short supply.