A SOLVABLE CRISIS?

The ban on mining iron-ore in Goa has crossed 18 months virtually killing all the aligned businesses and impacting 70,000 households and 3 lakh livelihoods

- Ashish Sinha

FOR MARUTI CHARI, the 63-year-old ace mechanic in Ponda, an industrial hub in south Goa bordering Karnataka, it is a matter of months before he winds up his popular truck repair garage spread over 2 acres of prime land. For more than 40 years now, Chari has been the ‘go-to’ mechanic for hundreds of trucks ferrying iron ore from nearby mines, including those in neighbouring Karnataka. After all his garage is right on the Ponda-Belgaum highway (NH-4).

“I was repairing 40-50 trucks a day before the mining ban. I have been recognised by most truck and auto companies. Today, not even four trucks come for repair/overhaul in two days and sometimes the whole week,” says Chari adding, “Saab kuch karo humare liye, hum roz marr rahe hain (Sir, please do something for us, we are dying every day).”

Chari owes around Rs 50 lakh to creditors. “I will wait till December. If mining does not restart, I will have to either sell my land or give it out on rent, which will be a very difficult thing for me to do,” he says.

Thanks to the ban on mining, there are others like Santosh Thambi, a machine operator with Chowgule Group company, Yeshwant Satgaonkar, a plant operator, and Sandeep M. Nirlekar, all ex-miners who are out of work and facing extreme financial crisis.

BW Businessworld was in southern Goa meeting out-of-work miners, barge owners, trucking companies, and equipment suppliers almost 19 months after mining came to a grinding halt in the state ever since the Supreme Court cancelled 88 mining leases on February 7, 2018, which halted mining activities beginning March 16, 2018.