No deaths due to mining trucks after SC halts activity: Goa CM

PANAJI: Not a single person was killed in road accidents involving trucks in the extraction activity since September last when mining was stopped on the directives of the Supreme Court, Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar told the House today.


A total of 685 road accidents were registered in the last three years involving mining trucks, claiming 61 lives and leaving as many as 306 injured, Parrikar said.

Mining activity in Goa was halted since September 2012 following directives of the Supreme Court, which has asked the Central Empowered Committee to investigate into allegations of illegal mining.

Parrikar said during the current year upto March 18, not a single person was killed due to road accident involving mining trucks.

The number of accidents also saw a decline last year, when mining stopped for last four months.

Statistics reveal that during 2010, there were 21 deaths and 120 people injured in mining truck accidents, while the number went up to 24 and 121 injured respectively in 2011.

In 2012, 16 people were killed and 65 injured. The state government in a an earlier statement had claimed that there are 20,000-odd mining trucks plying in the iron rich belt spread across seven talukas of the state.