Thane: Quarrying near Bhayandarpada raises concerns over safety of nearby buildings | Representational Image
Thane: Responding to activists’ fears of landslides due to stone quarrying at Bhayandarpada in Thane district, the State Environment Department has asked the collector to act. Environment director Abhay Pimparkar, in his email response, asked the Thane District collector to take necessary action, NatConnect Foundation which complained to the Chief Minister and top government officials at Mantralaya, said.
“We now look forward to the collector calling us for a site inspection for which our teams are ready,” NatConnect director B N Kumar said. The quarry activity is barely 30 metres from a residential tower and the building can cave in if the non-stop blasting continues, Kumar said.
Watchdog Foundation director Adv Godfrey Pimenta, who also raised the issue with the government, pointed out that quarrying is a blatant violation of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) order of September 2020 that prescribed the minimum distance of 200 metres between stone quarries and residential and public structures and 100 metres from blasting.
The Bhayandarpada site is barely 30 metres for a residential building, Pimenta said. The blasting and quarry activity with high vibrations also affects the structural strength of nearby skyscrapers, which could collapse like a pack of cards in the event of even minor seismic activity, he pointed out.
Noise and dust pollution are the other hazards that the people would face, Kumar said.
Quarries and residential colonies cannot co-exist, he said and called upon the government to plan the two segments of urban development carefully. NatConnect, which had earlier launched a campaign to save Parsik Hills from further quarrying, argued that the stone dust is highly pollutant.
The activists, therefore, called for an immediate official inspection of the site, order stop-work notice to the quarry, launch legal proceedings against those responsible for the violations and ensure the safety and well-being of the residents by taking necessary preventive measures.
The quarry ought to have taken a host of clearances and the government needs to check this and violations of the conditions stipulated in the permissions granted.
