New coal mine cleared in high conservation zone Hasdeo forest

📌 Summary:

• Forest Advisory Committee (FAC), chaired by the Director General of Forests, granted in-principle / Stage-I approval for diversion of 1,742.6 hectares in Hasdeo Arand forest (Surguja, Chhattisgarh) — classified as a "high conservation zone" in the government's own decision-support system tool

• Felling of 4,48,000 trees approved, with the specific condition that tree felling and mining will happen in phases

• Beneficiary: Rajasthan Vidyut Utpadan Nigam Limited (RVUNL) — coal block allotted in October 2015 for captive use at Chhabra and Suratgarh thermal power plants

• Kente Extension Coal Block (KECB) will be mined by the Adani Group as developer and operator

• This is the third large coal block cleared in Hasdeo — adding to Parsa Coal Block (PCB) and Parsa East Kente Basan (PEKB), both already operational; the area was once earmarked as a "no-go zone"

• RVUNL's thermal power plants (installed capacity: 7,830 MW) have an annual coal demand of ~24.05 MT; existing captive blocks (PEKB + PCB) provide only ~15 MT, hence the additional 9 MT to be met from KECB

• Phased mining structure: Phase-I (15 years): 1,001.95 ha; 97,837 trees in first 5 years + 59,712 trees in years 6-10 Phase-II: remaining 740.65 ha; mining permission linked to reforestation/biodiversity management in Phase-I 67,414 trees below 60 cm girth to be translocated rather than felled

• Compensatory afforestation (CA): 3,233.3 ha of degraded forest land proposed; 636 ha is "orange forest" not notified as forest in records; an earlier MoEFCC observation flagged that 1,054 ha of CA land was actually moderately dense forest; additional 1,217 ha identified, of which 1,086 ha suitable for plantation

• Wildlife concerns: KECB is less than 4 km from Lemru Elephant Corridor's buffer zone. Chhattisgarh government admitted to FAC that elephants, sloth bear, barking deer, jackals, fox, hyena, Indian grey wolf and wild pig are reported in/around the area. State concedes likely impact on elephant movement in/around Lemru Elephant Reserve

• Process concern: Clearance granted despite sustained opposition by tribal groups and civil-society representations to FAC opposing opening of another large coal block in a biodiversity-rich forest

🎯 UPSC Relevance: GS3 — Environment (forest diversion, biodiversity loss, Forest Conservation Act compliance, compensatory afforestation effectiveness, EIA), Energy (coal-power dependence vs renewable transition); GS2 — Tribal rights and FRA (consent of gram sabhas required under FRA, 2006), governance of MoEFCC clearances.

📝 Prelims Facts:

• Hasdeo Arand: Central India's largest contiguous unfragmented dense forest, in Korba/Surguja districts of Chhattisgarh; also known as the "lungs of Chhattisgarh"
• Lemru Elephant Reserve: located within Hasdeo region
• Forest Advisory Committee (FAC): chaired by Director General of Forests; appraises proposals for forest land diversion under the Forest Conservation Act, 1980
• Three operational coal blocks in Hasdeo: PEKB, PCB, KECB (Kente Extension)
• KECB area approved: 1,742.6 ha; trees to fell: 4.48 lakh
• KECB allottee: RVUNL; developer/operator: Adani Group
• RVUNL thermal plants: Chhabra and Suratgarh in Rajasthan (installed capacity 7,830 MW)

🔑 Key Term: Compensatory Afforestation — under Forest Conservation Act, 1980 and CAMPA (2016), any forest land diverted for non-forest use must be compensated by afforestation on an equivalent non-forest land (or twice the area of degraded forest land), funded by user agencies; effectiveness is contested because plantations rarely replicate ecological functions of natural forests.