New Delhi: Lok Sabha members Friday raised a host of issues, including inconvenience faced by passengers at airports and alleged irregularities in mining in Odisha and Jharkhand, and sought the Centre’s intervention.
Aparajita Sarangi, BJP member from Bhubaneswar, alleged large-scale irregularities in iron ore mining in Odisha and urged the Centre to order a probe.
She said several iron ore mines in Odisha were allotted by the state government through auction in 2020-21, but it is a matter of surprise that the allottees began showing huge quantities of low-grade iron from the sites within a year from where high-grade iron ore had been mined for last 20-30 years.
While the percentage of low-grade iron ore at these sites was pegged at merely 10.9 per cent in 2019-20, allottees of the mines took the quantity of such iron ore to 27.3 per cent within a year of allotment, and this figure went up further to 58.9 per cent in May this year, Sarangi said.
“This is causing a huge loss to the public exchequer,” she said, urging the Centre to immediately call for a report from the Odisha government and order probe the matter.
BJP MP Nishikant Dubey also alleged large scale irregularities in stone and sand mining in Jharkhand and urge the Centre to order a probe through the National Investigation Agency (NIA) and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
“Large-scale illegal stone and sand mining is happening in Jharkhand. The chief minister is involved. There should be a probe by the NIA and CBI into the matter,” he demanded.
Raising the issue of wages paid under rural job scheme (MGNREGA) in Bihar, Lok Jan Shakti Party (LJSP) member Veena Devi said the state government had promised to increase it but the workers are still getting just Rs 250 per day.
Payment of inadequate MGNREGA wages to workers is leading to higher migration of labourers from rural Bihar, she said.
“Kindly consider increasing their wages to Rs 400 per day,” the LJSP MP from Vaishali demanded.
Biju Janata Dal (BJD) member Chandrani Murmu raised the issue of safety of animals in mining areas.
“It is a major issue,” she said and urged the Centre to ensure safety of elephant corridors in mining areas.
She also demanded that a study be conducted into the matter.
Highlighting the problems faced by flyers during Zero Hour, Congress member K Jayakumar said the airlines only refund a small amount of the fare to the passengers on cancellation of their tickets.
“While cancelling the tickets, the airlines are taking more than 75 per cent of the amount. Hardly any amount is being returned to the passengers who are cancelling the tickets,” the Thiruvallur MP charged.
“The pathetic thing is that some of the airlines like Indigo are auctioning the seats. During web check-in, if you do not pay, you will not get a boarding pass at all. You have to get it at the airport. It is a very difficult thing when you rush to the airport to catch a flight,” he added.
Jayakumar also accused the airlines of levying “a variety of abnormal and unreasonable taxes” and also inventing “new names” to charge various other fees.
“For example, airlines are charging aviation security fee, user development fee etc. Recently, a tax was introduced by Indigo airline called ‘CUTE tax’. This is for common use of terminal equipment by the passengers. The Airport Authority (of India) is levying its own tax,” he added.
The Congress member urged Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia to look into these issue and ensure that air passengers do not face any inconvenience.
“All these things should be taken care of. We have a dynamic Civil Aviation minister. He should apply his mind and look into it so that passengers do not face any inconvenience,” Jayakumar said.
PTI