Goa’s new gold rush?
It’s an astounding claim; that India could soon figure among the top
gold-producing countries in the world. Microbiology lecturer Nandkumar
Kamat says that there is almost 6,000 metric tonnes of secondary gold
worth a staggering Rs120,000 crore lying just 60 metres below the ground
in Goa. Claims Mr Kamat, it is biologically refined gold, almost 98 per
cent pure, and spread over 40 crore sq metres of land.
But the fact is, as Mr Kamat himself admitted during the press
conference he called to announce his ‘discovery’, that the origin of
secondary gold grains is controversial and still being debated in the
scientific community. It is relatively recent research that suggests
microbes can form gold deposits, transporting and precipitating gold to
form grains and nuggets in alluvial deposits. In fact, this was the
subject of doctoral research by Frank Reith at the Australian National
University, Canberra, published as recently as 2004. Quaintly, Mr Reith
is the very same ‘authority’ that Mr Kamat relies upon to authenticate
his find.
It is very difficult to verify or deny Mr Kamat’s claim. He says that
some of the bacterial forms of gold he has seen include folded lattices,
starfish assemblages and layered crowns. This can only be confirmed or
denied by a proper peer review process, for which he will first have to
write a scientific paper. Even after this, actual confirmation (or
otherwise) of the presence of the noble metal in quantities that can be
commercially exploited will only come with regular physical prospecting.
But even if the presence of gold is confirmed, it is certainly not
correct to say that these deposits have the potential to change the
fortunes of the country or even the state over the foreseeable future.
While the quantum of gold estimated by Mr Kamat is within the bounds of
commercial viability (1.5g to 2g per tonne) for open cast mining, which
is theoretically possible at the depth of 60 metres that he postulates,
gold mining would visit a catastrophic environmental disaster on Goa.
Today, most people in the state are concerned about iron ore mining, in
which around six tonnes of reject mud is generated for every tonne of
ore extracted. This itself is drying up village wells, making rich paddy
fields infertile and silting up our streams and rivers.
What happens if and when gold mining is started, where over 10 tonnes of
waste mud will be generated for every ‘tola’ of gold extracted? What
happens when the gold extraction process, which uses either toxic
mercury, or even more toxic and deadly cyanide, is used on a large scale
in Goa? That is when there will be destruction of the environment on an
unprecedented scale.
Mr Kamat may have been in a hurry to go the media because he wanted to
get the credit he feels is due to him for his ‘discovery’ of gold
deposits in Goa. He may throw open challenges to the scientific
community – local, national and global – and even win them. But he
cannot fail to be aware of the gargantuan destructive potential that the
possibility of gold mining in Goa holds.
http://oheraldo.in/newscategory/Edit/15
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