Minister's brother gets interim bail in illegal coal mining case

The Meghalaya High Court hasgranted interim bail to cabinet minister Kyrmen Shylla'sbrother Bison Shylla and his aide for their allegedinvolvement in illegal coal mining in which 6 people werekilled in an accident recently, officials said Thursday.

The bail applications filed by Bison Shylla and TiufillShadap came up for hearing before the single bench of JusticeW Diengdoh Wednesday.

In its order, the bench allowed the petitioners to beenlarged on interim bail on condition that they shall notabscond and tamper with evidence and witnesses.

The court has also directed the accused persons tocooperate with the investigation officer (IO) as and whenrequired.

The plea for grant of pre-arrest bail was made inconnection with the FIR filed on January 22 and registeredwith the Khliehriat police station. It was also submitted thatthe two persons were not involved in the incident.

However, the police came looking for them in connectionwith the said case for which a reasonable apprehension ofbeing arrested by the police has occurred.

The bench also heard N.D. Chullai, Additional AdvocateGeneral who submitted that he requires some time to seekproper instruction and also to cause the C/D of Khliehriat PSCase No. 07(01)2021 to be produced before this court.

In view of this, the bench directed the IO to produce thecase dairy (CD) on the next date of hearing fixed on February17.

As Meghalaya police have launched a crackdown againstillegal coal mine owners, the NGT Committee had recently askedthe state government to take stringent actions against thoseinvolved in the illegal extraction of the mineral.

In December 2018, 15 miners were feared dead and only twoof the bodies were fished out of another illegal coal mine inEast Jaintia Hills district.

Coal mining and transportation is banned by the NGT since2014 with interim relaxation for transportation of alreadyextract coal and the coal which were auctioned off as perorders of the Supreme Court.