After prolonging the issue on sand policy of over five months of hard talk of putting its own MLAs, if found engaged in illegal sand mining, taking action against the officials, mounting GPRS to monitor trucks carrying sand, on Wednesday the Andhra Pradesh Government has announced that it is back to the old policy on sand mining.

Hyderabad: Bowing down to the pressure mounted, the Andhra Pradesh government on Wednesday had given up its ambition sand mining policy to empower about one lakh and odd Self Help Group of Women in the State.

Making it official, during the cabinet meeting held at Vijayawada, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has announced that the sand mining in the state would be put for open auction. However, the price of the sale would be decided by the Joint Collectors in the District.
This is the first time that Naidu has ever taken a ‘U’ turn from the stated policy relating to the SHGs as the Chief Minister, both united AP and at present.

For over five months, Naidu has come under tremendous pressure from within the party demanding for a roll back on handing over sand mining to the SHGs. Also, none other than his own cabinet colleagues had made their view clear that the government’s ambition to handover sand mining to SHGs has indeed caused much damage to the image of the government.

Earlier to asking the views of his cabinet ministers, Naidu had made a tough talk stating that he would not hesitate to put his own MLAs behind the bars if found engaged in illegal sand mining. And, the Chief Minister had also directed the purchase of CCTV cameras to monitor the sand reaches remotely to checkmate the illegal operations at the sand reaches. Adding to this, he also asked the officials to mount GPRS on the trucks carrying loads of sand from different sand reaches across the state, so as to monitor their movement.

Not satisfied with all this, he took the district collectors and superintendent’s of police for not able to contain the growing sand mafia in the state. Relieved of the government giving up on running the sand mining by the SHGS, a Senior Police Official from Eluru Range said, ” Everyone in the government knows who all are engaged in the sand mining in the name of SHGs. This has been a headache both for the revenue and police since the new sand mining policy had been announced by the government.”

Now from February 1, 2016, the sand reaches in the state would go under the hammer. But, playing safe the government has also announced that people could take sand free of cost from the streams and rivulets and similar small water bodies nearby their villages for
the construction of toilets and for personal use. However, the sand available in the rivers will come under commercial activity. Further, the government too can mine and take sand free of cost for its own usage for the purpose laying roads, construction of housing and others.