Loading…
Union Minister Shri Nitin Gadkari conferred the Sarvottam Jeevan Raksha Padak on 12 rat miners for their role in the Silkyara Tunnel Rescue Operation.
The investiture ceremony was held in New Delhi in the presence of the Minister of State for Road Transport and Highways and the Managing Director of NHIDCL.
The rescue drew on the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, NHIDCL, the Border Roads Organisation, the Indian Army, the Government of Uttarakhand and technical specialists.
Engineering solutions deployed included vertical drilling alongside other approaches.
The operation was monitored at the highest level, with resources mobilised for the safe evacuation of the trapped workers.
The Jeevan Raksha Padak series recognises acts of courage in saving life, and is distinct from the gallantry awards given for valour in the face of the enemy. It has three grades, of which Sarvottam Jeevan Raksha Padak is the highest, followed by Uttam Jeevan Raksha Padak and Jeevan Raksha Padak - the series is open to civilians, which is what makes it the appropriate honour here. What makes this particular award notable is who received it. Rat-hole mining is a manual excavation technique in which workers crawl into narrow horizontal tunnels and dig by hand - a method banned for coal extraction because of how dangerous and exploitative it is. At Silkyara, mechanised augur drilling had failed, and it was precisely this hand-excavation skill that broke through the final stretch of debris to reach the trapped workers. The recognition therefore sits on an uncomfortable fact: the country's most advanced tunnelling machinery was defeated, and the men who succeeded practise a technique India has outlawed in mining. The multi-agency composition - MoRTH, NHIDCL, the Border Roads Organisation, the Army and the State government - reflects how large-scale rescue in difficult terrain actually works, with no single agency holding all the required capability.
Simple Analogy: The machine got most of the way through and stopped; the last few metres were dug by hand.
General Awareness > Awards and Honours
General Awareness > Current Affairs
GS Paper 3 > Disaster Management
General Knowledge > Awards and Disaster Response
Awards and their hierarchies are a staple of SSC and Railway general awareness.
The highest of the three-tier Jeevan Raksha Padak series recognising acts of courage in saving life.
Three grades - Sarvottam, Uttam and Jeevan Raksha Padak - open to civilians, distinct from gallantry awards for valour against the enemy.
Manual excavation through narrow horizontal tunnels, banned for coal mining, which succeeded at Silkyara where mechanised drilling failed.
National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited, which was executing the Silkyara tunnel project.
The agency building and maintaining roads in border and difficult terrain, among those deployed in the rescue.