Odisha’s Keonjhar district finalises beneficiaries 7 years after District Mineral Foundation scheme began

District Mineral Foundation funds have eluded the real mining-affected population while it was spent in an area relatively unaffected by mines, alleges BJP chief whip

Odisha’s Keonjhar district is India’s highest recipient of funds under the District Mineral Foundation (DMF) scheme, and has spent ₹3,000 crore under the scheme over the past seven years, but the district has only recently finalised who the real beneficiaries are.

At its meeting last month, The 11 th Trust Board of DMF-Keonjhar approved 106 new villages as those directly affected by mining operations, taking the total tally of such villages to 491. According to the Trust Board, all other villages in Keonjhar will be treated as indirectly affected as well.

With a geographical area of 8,303 sq km, Keonjhar is hugely rich in mineral reserves, especially iron ore. The district has 2,555 million tonnes of iron ore available beneath its soil, of which approximately 50 million tonnes is extracted each year, a key driver of Odisha’s economy.

The DMF fund is augmented by mining companies’ contribution of 30% of their royalty amount for mining leases. In Keonjhar, the total DMF fund collection has touched an astounding ₹8,840 crore, the highest for any district in India.

The DMF holds enormous potential to improve the lives of people in Keonjhar, a district where 62% of the population lives below the poverty line, especially marginalised groups such as tribals and other forest dwelling communities. As per the Census 2011, Scheduled Tribes constitute 44.5% of the district’s population, while 11.62% are Scheduled Castes.

Now, the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party and citizens groups in Keonjhar have raised questions on the very premise of the fund’s huge expenditures.

In 2016, 12 mineral-rich States, including Odisha, executed and prepared the guidelines for the DMF. As a first step, before spending DMF funds, the board should have undertaken a detailed survey identifying directly affected villages falling within a 10-km radius of the mines. In 2017, the fifth board meeting accepted the recommendation of a mining officer who submitted a list of 495 villages who are directly affected.