RAWALPINDI: The Punjab government has finally decided to crack down on stone crushers on Margalla Hills near Islamabad from next week to save the national park.

The provincial authorities had identified more than 64 stone crushers operating in the buffer zone of Margalla Hills despite the ban imposed by the federal government.

The federal government has declared Margalla Hills as national park and imposed a ban on stone crushing in October 2010.

Since then, the Islamabad administration has stopped the stone crushers from operating in the area falling in its administrative control but the crushers in Rawalpindi district areas have been doing their illegal business with impunity.

Crushers are operating in the areas falling in Rawalpindi district’s jurisdiction

However, the Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, finally woke up to the issue and called a meeting on August 5 (Wednesday) and decided to stop the operation of the stone crushers in phases.

Commissioner Zahid Saeed told Dawn that the local administration had chalked out a plan which would be implemented from next week. He said the action would be taken in two phases.

“In the first phase, Iesco will suspend the electricity supply to the stone crushers and then, the district administration will cancel the licence of explosive material used to blast the mines,” he said.

He said without the electricity and explosive material, the stone crushing machines would become inoperative and the owners would have to leave the place. He said that the administration would not use police force in any circumstances.

It may be mentioned here that the stone crushers are polluting the environment and created health problems for the local residents.

As per survey of Environment Protection Agency-Punjab (EPA-Punjab) conducted last year, more than 200 stone crushing machines have been installed on Margalla Hills in the jurisdiction of Rawalpindi district.

“Punjab-EPA will also serve notices on the remaining 153 stone crushers next week to press them to adopt measures aimed at protecting environment,” District Officer Environment Mohammad Nawaz told Dawn.

He said the stone crushing machine owners did not adopt safety measures against the pollution like installation of water sprinklers for suppression of suspended particulate matter (SPM) there.

He said that all these crush machines were conducting their operation without getting environmental impact assessment (EIA) from Punjab-EPA. He said that under Section 12 of Environment Protection Act, it was necessary to get EIA.

He said the residents of adjoining area were facing a lot of problem due to noise producing from the rock blasting or dust it emits during this process. He said they had no gadgets to check the intensity of blast.

Published in Dawn, August 8th, 2015

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