The farmlands in Goa, which stand devastated due to the run-off from reckless mining activity, are likely to get special attention in the State Mining Policy, which is on the anvil.
Indications are that the mining policy, which is likely to be ready by May-end, may dwell upon critical issues faced by the non-mining community, which is on the edge due to the flagrant extraction and transportation of ore.
Senior officers in the State Secretariat told PTI that issues such as dust pollution, run-off from the mines, agricultural and farmland ravaged by pollution are likely to figure prominently in the policy which talks of sustainable mining of iron ore in the State.
Several farmlands in seven iron ore-rich talukas in the coastal State lie parched due to the scarcity of water and the piling up of silt washed away during the monsoon.
The river bodies in these areas too have turned muddy due to the release of rejected ore, stacked at the mining site, into them.
The State Government has already banned desilting of the farms as several illegal miners used to carry out digging under the pretext of cleaning up the silt from the paddy fields, farms and lakes.
Henceforth, the State will have control over the process of removing mud from the farms and money earned from the sale of extracted ore would be ploughed back into the development of farming.
Several villages are on the brink of getting flooded in the monsoon due to the unstable walls of the ponds on the mining sites.
In the last five years, Advalpal and its adjoining Mulgao villages saw houses being flooded by murky water after the walls of the pond were breached.