No difference between irregular, illegal mining: Hegde
September 25th, 2011 - 6:46 pm ICT by IANSPanaji, Sep 25 (IANS) A day after the Congress’s Goa unit sought to draw a distinction between “irregular” and “illegal” mining, former Karnataka Lokayukta N. Santosh Hegde Sunday stressed there was no difference as both entailed cheating.
“There is no difference between illegal or irregular mining. In both cases there is cheating,” said Hegde, whose explosive report on the illegal mining in Karnataka resulted in the exposure of one of the biggest illegal scandals in India and downfall of the B.S. Yeddyurappa government.
Hegde’s comments come a day after state Congress president Subhash Shirodkar said that there was virtually no illegal mining in Goa and that at most, it was “irregular”. “There is a vast difference between irregularities and illegalities,” the Congress leader said.
Commenting on his experiences a Lokayukta and the probe against illegal mining, Hegde said that had he continued in office for a mere two more months, the office of the Lokayukta would have broken the backbone of the entire illegal mining industry in the state.
“With mere five officers, we scrutinized four lakh docmuments and assessed 40 lakh bank accounts… If we had got two more months more, we would have literally nailed everyone involved in Bellary illegal mining scam,” said Hegde, during a workshop on making of the draft Lokayukta 2011 bill here.
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- Illegal mining report looms large over Goa (Goa Newsletter) - Mar 17, 2012
- I salute Santosh Hegde: Parrikar - Jul 30, 2010
- Lokayukta's report on illegal mining: Main points - Jul 27, 2011
- Mining lobby, politicians tried to hijack Hegde's events: Activists - Apr 26, 2011
- Criminal involvement of Yeddyurappa in mining scam: Santosh Hegde (Interview) - Jul 24, 2011
- Goa mining scam: Ruling NCP demands thorough probe - Sep 24, 2011
- Hegde should apologise, says Karunakara Reddy - Jul 29, 2011
- With Bellary win, rebel Reddy brothers show BJP their clout - Dec 04, 2011
- Congress guns for Yeddyurappa, BJP hits back - Jul 21, 2011
- Karnataka mining report could trigger political explosion (Karnataka Newsletter) - Jul 21, 2011
- Hegde rebuts Yeddyurappa's criticism - Nov 16, 2011
- Yeddyurappa, others named in illegal mining report: Santosh Hegde - Jul 21, 2011
- Congress demands action on Lokayukta phone tap - Jul 24, 2011
Tags: backbone, bank accounts, congress leader, congress president, distinction, downfall, experiences, goa, India, irregularities, karnataka, lakh, mining industry, santosh, scandals, shirodkar, state congress, subhash