The Supreme Court, which has banned mining activities in the eco-sensitive Aravalli zone in Haryana, on Thursday gave “in-principle” permission to the state government to identify 600 hectares of land in the area where it could carry out mining of minor minerals, commonly referred to as construction material.

Indicating that it may consider allowing mining of such materials on a limited tract of land, the special bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan ordered the state to first come up with a “Reclamation and Rehabilitation Plan” for the area already devastated by the unabated mining operations carried out in the past. This means it may take up to one year for actual mining operations to begin on the proposed 600 hectares of land.

The state, which had earlier sought a complete ban on mining “as such minerals were being used in large-scale construction activities in the Capital and adjoining areas”, later seemed to have softened its approach . Agreeing with advocates Ranjeet Kumar and A D N Rao, assisting the court as amicus curaie, the bench granted time to Haryana government for identifying the land.