The Supreme Court on Wednesday shot down an idea for redrawing boundaries of ‘C’ category mines to make them attractive for interested parties for iron ore extraction in Ballari, Tumakuru and Chitradurga districts. The court also castigated the state over its failure to check "plundering" of natural resources. It restrained the state government from conducting any more auction of the remaining 51 'C' category mines. "These mines do not find any response (takers) in two round of auctions. We can’t go on laying down norms for their operation. If those mines are not economically viable, close it down," a three-judge bench presided over by Justice Ranjan Gogoi said. The court was responding to a plea made by senior advocate Raju Ramachandran, along with advocate Anita Shenoy, for redrawing the boundaries of 51 ‘C’ category of mines, to make it economically viable. These mines were shut down by the court. But, they were subsequently allowed for reopening with certain strict conditions including intergenerational equity. Senior advocate Shyam Divan, appearing for the apex court-appointed Central Empowered Committee (CEC), said it was not opposed to Consortium to Sponge Iron Plants participating in auction of the remaining 43 ‘C’ category of mines. Karnataka government informed the court that only seven out of 51 ‘C’ category mines, earlier closed due to various illegalities, were sold in the auctions held recently. Divan said that all of those 51 mines were not involved in excessive extraction of iron ores, some did encroachment and some were used as front and benami for sale of natural resources. He said illegalities resorted to by them varied from case-to-case basis. The CEC supported the plea by the state government for redrawing of the boundaries. However, the bench, also comprising Justices P C Ghose and Navin Sinha, said, "this redrawing of boundary is very vague. If they (mines) do not have reserve of iron ore, close it down." On this, Ramachandran submitted, "Yes, 20 of ‘C’ category of mines can be closed down." This did not go down well with the bench, which asked, "Why did the state government not confide earlier that 20 mines could be closed down. Why are you then asking for redrawing of boundaries?" "We do not rule out anything at this stage. In view of the fantastic role played by the state government in plundering of resources, we won’t take your suggestion. You did nothing when they (miners) were doing roaring business," the bench said. The court, however, asked the Karnataka government as well as the CEC to file their response within four weeks as to why these remaining ‘C’ category of mines may not be closed down.