AARYAN SHARMA
JAMMU: Building ‘home sweet home’ in and around Jammu is getting costlier due to acute shortage of reta (sand) and Bajri (gravel) for past several days.
The shortage of building material has led to black marketing of these important ingredients creating piquant situation for those people who are currently carrying out construction work.
Due to failure in inviting tenders, in the wake of political instability, the extraction of sand was going on unabated possibly in connivance with local police authorities.
According to local builders and suppliers of building material, the prices of ‘sand’ and ‘gravel’ trolleys have shot up considerably during the past couple of days forcing large number of people to either stop construction or go slow waiting for the normalisation of prices of these items.
Rough estimates suggest that a sand trolley is costing over and above Rs 5,000 while rates of gravel are also sky rocketing and playing havoc with the budget estimates of under construction houses.
The scarcity has been caused ever since the state government has put its foot down to check the rampant sand mining on river beds.
The crusher units who were allowing large scale smuggling of building material have also come under scanner as the government has imposed hefty penalty for violating the norms warning them if they remain operational after working hours strict action and hefty penalty would be imposed.
At the same time delay caused on the part of the government to issue licences to the registered builders is adding to the miseries of the common people as they have been exploited by all and minting their hard earned money.
Before the year end closure, the government failed to complete the necessary formalities and also failed to extend the time period to allow licensed builders to complete the necessary formalities.
Several local builders claimed the local police authorities are allegedly coming to the aid of mafia responsible for large scale mining of Tawi river beds in and around Jammu.
Till date no major action has been taken against those who have been indulging in illegal mining of sand from the Tawi river bed.
According to local builders, the state government was losing major share of royalty due to nexus between the nomadic population (Gujjars) gradually shifting to the business of extracting sand material from the river beds and contractors.
Soon after the formation of the alliance government large number of builders and those engaged in the job of mining called on Industries and commerce Minister Chandra Prakash Ganga on Tuesday and urged him to intervene in the matter and immediately stop illegal smuggling of sand and gravel by those living near the river bed.
The delegation also apprised the Minister the entire river bed has been illegally encroached by Gujjars and they are the same people who have been engaged in the job of illegal mining during late hours.
