100-year-old fire in coalfield poses threat

Patna: A century-old raging inferno inside the belly of the earth has now started affecting the lives of families living in Jharia, a mining town of Dhanbad in Jharkhand.

About 64 fire zones have sprouted up at Jharia, which is also one of the largest and most productive coalfields in the country. Experts say that two-thirds of electricity produced in the country comes from the coal-fired plants.

If activists and social groups are to be believed, overe one lakh people have been affected due to the underground fire. Experts say that the first fire was detected in the year 1916 and coalfields in the area have been burning ever since.

In May, a 10-year-old boy and his father lost their lives after they slipped into one of the fire pits. Locals recall the boy was walking when he was sucked into the burning crater.

His father Bablu Khan too slipped into the hole, while he was trying to save his son. Both the father and son were declared dead by the rescue team after they couldn’t find their bodies.

The authorities said that the rescue operation was stopped after experts recorded a temperature of more than 80 degrees inside the burning crater. Two days after the incident, four more persons fell unconscious when cavity on the land, released poisonous gases.

According to an estimate, around 2,500 tonnes of coal is burnt every day in the underground fire.  Experts claim that more than 17 billion tonnes of coal have been affected due to Jharia fire. Activists fighting for people’s rehabilitation are also concerned over the coal scavenging being done by women and children. They say that their illegal activity is exposing them directly to poisonous gases, which affect their health drastically.

“Villagers, who do not work for Bharat Coking Coal Ltd (BCCL) or other subsidiary coal firms make their livelihood by coal scavenging. Mostly women and children are involved in this activity. They manage to enter the coal mines and gather unburned pieces of coal, which they sell outside the mines. This is their only source of economy,” Pinaki Roy, a social activist associated with Jharia Bachao Samiti told this newspaper.

Women and girls on their way back after scavenging for coal.

The task of rehabilitation and resettlement of one lakh families from 595 endangered sites was given to the Jharia Rehabilitation and Development Authority (JRDA). As per an official report, Jharia Rehabilitation and Development Authority (JRDA) has constructed 3,072 houses in Belogaria area where 2,700 families have been shifted, while over 50,000 families are still waiting for their turn to be evacuated from the affected zone.

Officials said that affected families will be evacuated from the fire zone on the basis of a survey, conducted by the JRDA in 2009. The JRDA had identified more than 54,000 families eligible for rehabilitation, who are living in the affected zone.

According to Mr Roy, “The Centre and the BCCL are jointly responsible for the condition in Jharia”.

He said that the action plan to rehabilitate the victims to a safe site was approved by the Supreme Court in 2009, but “nothing has been done so far and steps being taken by the government are not enough. Everything is moving at a snail’s speed”.

Jharkhand chief secretary Raj Bala Verma visited Jharia recently to review the on-going rehabilitation work and directed the authorities to concentrate more on dangerous sites.

In June this year, the railways decided to stop all train operations on the 41-km-long Dhanbad-Chandrapura stretch in Jharia coalfields zone following the Union coal ministry’s report, claiming that fires in the coal mines has made the area vulnerable.

Sources said, the land around the section had started caving in due to the raging underground fire. At the same time, the closure of the railway line in the area has affected the movement of 37 passenger and freight trains, resulting in a loss of `7 crores per day.

Jharia Bachao Samiti president, Ashok Agarwal, said, “The township is on the verge of an ecological and human disaster.”

Save Jharia movement activists said that the government has started holding discussions and making plans to shift the families after a PIL was filed in 2004.

Factfile

• Over one lakh people have been affected due to the underground fire in Jharia
• The first fire was detected in the year 1916 and the Jharia coalfield has been burning ever since, experts say
• Around 2,500 tonnes of coal is burnt per day in the underground fire. More than 17 billion tonnes of coal have been consumed so far
• The task of rehabilitation of one-lakh families from 595 sites was given to Jharia Rehabilitation and Development Authority
• So far, the JRDA has constructed 3,072 houses in Belogaria where 2,700 families have been shifted
• Movement of 37 trains has been stopped, which has resulted in a loss of `7 crores per day to the railways