Gujarat govt deploys drones to keep tabs on illegal mining

Ahmedabad: The Gujarat government on Monday launched Trinetra, a drone-based surveillance project to check illegal mining. Drones will be deployed to monitor riverbeds, where illegal sand mining is said to be rampant.

Inaugurating the project, chief minister Vijay Rupani said the decision to use technology was taken after tracking activities of state departments such as police, mines and minerals, which directly concern the public, to keep an eye on illegal activities.

He said the project is part of the state’s government policy of providing transparent and corruption-free governance.

The project will gradually cover the state’s entire geographical area of about 200,000sq. km, beginning with sensitive zones. It will be gradually extended to water supply, roads and buildings and other departments.

Rupani said drones will conduct surveillance of rivers such as the Sabarmati, Orsang, Tapi and Bhadar. “We have introduced the ‘Pocket Cop’ application for the police department and it has proven to be helpful . In the same way, I believe the Trinetra technology will help control the sand mafia,” he said.

Giving details of the state government’s efforts to check illegal mining of minerals, geology and mines commissioner Rupwant Singh said detailed digitisation of mines is being done on altitude and latitude basis.