India, March 10 -- A February 5 dynamite blast in an illegal coal mine in Meghalaya killed 34 labourers, exposing the persistence of banned rat-hole mining.

Despite an NGT ban in 2014 and Supreme Court oversight, illegal extraction continues across East Jaintia Hills.

Residents live with collapsing hillsides, poisoned water sources and threats from powerful coal networks.

Informal migrant labourers work without safety gear, wages protection or health access in hazardous underground mines.

Two-dimensional land mapping fails to capture the three-dimensional impacts of mining beneath hills.

On the morning of February 5, 2026, a dynamite explosion in an illegal coal mine at Mynsyngat in the Thangkso area of East Jaintia Hills, Meghalaya,...