Ramesh indicates softening of stand on No-Go

Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh is understood to have softened his stand on issues related to coal mining in No-Go areas.

At the same time, he maintained there was no question of reviewing the classification of 'Go' and 'No-Go' norms for coal mining, even as a Group of Minister (GoM) favoured that the issue be tackled on case-by-case basis for now.

According to officials, in the second meeting of the GoM headed by Pranab Mukherjee today, the environment minister has indicated that the Comprehensive Environment Pollution Index (CEPI) would be relaxed further.

CEPI captures the various health dimensions of the environment and acts as a warning tool to facilitate early intervention.

In 2009, the Ministry of Environment and Forests had introduced CEPI to categorise the environmental quality at given locations and conducted a nation-wide assessment of industrial clusters.

No official comment was available regarding CEPI.

Coal Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal, a member of the 12-member GoM, told reporters after the meeting that it was a "fruitful" discussion.

The meeting lasted for about two hours but failed to take any final call on the issue.

With the no solutions emerging on the No-Go issue, the GoM will meet again in another two or three weeks.

In the first meeting of the GoM last month, Ramesh had assured the coal ministry that he would be "positive" towards infrastructure projects.

The environment ministry had last year classified the country's heavily forested regions into Go and No-Go regions. A ban was imposed on mining in No-Go zones through an indicative categorisation on environmental grounds.

The move had sparked off an intense inter-ministerial row, pulling into its ambit three infrastructure ministries of coal, power and steel on one side and Ramesh on the other.

Coal blocks with reserves of 600 million tonnes, linked to power projects of over 130,000 megawatt capacity, have been stuck in No-Go areas.