Jammu, Jan 30: Secretary, Mining, Amit Sharma on Monday held an extensive meeting with major stakeholders of Mining Department including the National Highway Authority of India and its major executing agencies, namely M/s Gayatri, M/s Megha and others. Director Geology & Mining, Project Director, NHAI, MD, J&K Minerals Limited, Additional Secretary Mining, Joint Director Geology & Mining, Senior Law Officer and other officers of Mining attended the meeting. The Secretary Mining gave a patient hearing regarding critical issues relating to ongoing projects of national importance including the Katra-Amrtisar Expressway, Ring Road, National Highway expansion, etc. a lot of issues were resolved in the meeting and instructions were issued by Mining Secretary to the departmental officers to facilitate smooth provisioning of Mining materials with timely issuance of Short Term Permits and Disposal Permits to these agencies, as and when requisitioned by them after fulfillment of necessary steps. The NHAI team expressed deep gratitude to the Secretary Mining and his team for adopting a proactive approach in the last few months which is now helping in the provisioning of permits to project proponents within no time and fast-tracking work in ongoing major projects. The rest of the hiccups were also noted by the departmental officers for immediate redressal which was noted and endorsed by the Secretary Mining who took a tour of mining operations sites for the major ongoing national projects along with concerned District Mineral Officers over the last weekend. Amit Sharma directed his team that fortnightly meetings should be held at the directorate level and monthly reviews shall also be taken by him to ensure clearance of all pendencies in the future. Before concluding, the Secretary Mining directed his team to regularly update the HLG office, portal and also, and administrative department during weekly meetings regarding achievements for provisioning mining materials for ongoing projects of national importance in J&K.
