Multi Crore Mining Scam unearthed in Punjab
Kanwar Inder Singh/ royalpatiala.in News/ February 6,2025
Punjab government Secretary Mines and Geology Gurkirat Kirpal Singh, IAS has written an official letter to the Director General of Police, Gaurav Yadav, IPS to direct the cyber crime wing of the state police to initiate an investigation into the ‘fraudulent practices being undertaken in the online sale of sand/gravel in the state by the crusher units’, after the Chief Engineer Drainage-cum-Mining and Geology Harinderpal Singh Bedi has uncovered a scam.
In the letter to DGP, Gurkirat Kirpal Singh, IAS said “ what is particularly concerning is that the report suggests a possible link of the data generated by the official site with these fraudulent sites, which can only happen if the data is being stolen/ shared in some manner.”
He requested to DGP Gaurav Yadav, IPS to take immediate cognizance and direct the Cyber Crime Wing to initiate an investigation into the matter. In addition the creation/ existence of fraudulent sites may kindly be mentioned and these may be blocked as soon as these are detected.”
As per sources, Chief Engineer Drainage-cum-Mining and Geology Harinderpal Singh Bedi highlights a massive scam being perpetrated in Punjab through a fake and illegal website https://minesgeologypunjab.in/. This website falsely represents Punjab Government official https://minesandgeology.punjab.gov.in/. organization, potentially defrauding unsuspecting individuals.
Bedi pointed out that government website https://minesandgeology.punjab.gov.in/ URL has been smishing site URL https://minesgeologypunjab.in/ this URL looks same but operated by the illegal people. This portal was built in May,2020 and data has been shifted to DGR on 15.5.2022 . The site was registered on 30.10.2024 and the domain will be expired on 20.10.2025.
He pointed out that “a person from Punjab has registered this illegal website. Most probably, this site is only used for redirection so that the traffic can be moved to another site so that people will get confuse with the original site. Both the sites have been landing on the same page as government website page on click on the Skip login the respective page will be opened.
The mining department officers had also checks the few sites that were already created http://minesandgeology.punjab.gov.in/ and similar illegal site miningpunjab.com site was registered in 2007 and still in place.
Bedi pointed out that “it is respectfully, submitted that the matter need to be investigated in details and found that this big scam in the mining department Punjab. As per initial estimation this scam will not be less than 100 crores or more. This states that it’s directly revenue loss to the Punjab government.”
He requested to investigate the role of XEN Mining Headquarter, SDO Mining HQ, consultant giving secret information (T form, Q form, QR Code) to the scamming agency. Also need to investigate the role of officer/ official who was in-charge for developing portal since 2021. Along with these the point of investigation is from 2020, how much data has been generated and misused to identify how much revenue loss was due to this activity. Also need to check, how much sites have been created, this will give the benefit the contractor.
