From coal pits to quiet waters: how India is reshaping abandoned mines into lifelines
Chattisgarh: In a moonless night in Surajpur, the still surface of a lake reflects nothing but darkness. Standing at its edge, 78-year-old Pannelal Rajak sweeps a beam of light across the water and points into the distance. “My land was there,” he says quietly.
Decades ago, that stretch of land was not a lake but part of the sprawling Bishrampur open-cast coal mineone of many that powered India’s industrial rise.
Today, it is part of Kenapara Eco Park, a reclaimed landscape where paddle boats glide over deep green water and a floating restaurant serves visitors on weekends.
Rajak’s life mirrors this transformation. Once promised a job in the mine after giving up his land, he says he was denied work due to a disability. Now, he guards the same site no longer a source of coal, but of cautious hope.
“At least I am earning something here now,” he says.A second life for exhausted landIndia, the world’s second-largest coal producer and consumer, is confronting a new reality: hundreds of mines are reaching the end of their productive life. In response, authorities and state-run firms are turning to land reclamation and adaptive reuse to transform these sites into sustainable economic zones.
The Bishrampur mine, spread across 1,472 hectares, produced over 38 million tonnes of coal between 1961 and 2018. When reserves ran dry, its vast pits some naturally filled with rainwater over time offered an unexpected opportunity.
Instead of leaving behind barren scars, local authorities, with support from South Eastern Coalfields Ltd, a subsidiary of Coal India Ltd, began converting the site into a tourism hub.
Boating facilities, cottages, a floating restaurant, and green spaces gradually replaced extraction machinery and dust. What was once an industrial void is now a modest but growing attraction, drawing around 150 visitors on weekends.
At the heart of this transformation are women from the Shiv Shakti Mahila Gram Sangathan, a self-help group that manages key operations at the eco park. For many of them, the shift is not just economic but deeply personal.
“In the village, most women are only housewives. Our movements were restricted,” says Anjani Singh, a boat operator. “Working here, meeting officials and people gave us confidence.”Their work rowing boats, managing visitors, running the floating restaurant has reshaped how they are seen in their community.
No longer identified solely by family roles, they are now known for their work.Savita Gupta, who runs the floating eatery, describes her journey as transformative.
Once confined to domestic responsibilities, she now serves tourists, manages supplies, and earns an income. “I hope my daughter will learn from my life and think about becoming an independent woman,” she says.
The group’s leader, Pooja Sahu, adds that the change is as much about identity as it is about livelihood. “We wanted to be known by our own names,” she says.
The eco park is only one part of a broader regeneration effort. Nearby, a pisciculture project has turned the lake into a source of fish production, supplying local markets and creating additional income streams.
A 40-hectare solar park, generating 12 megawatts of power, employs local residents, including young technicians like Pawan Kumar, who now earns a steady monthly income.
Reforestation efforts are also underway. Hundreds of hectares have been planted with trees such as sheesham and mango, slowly restoring ecological balance to land once stripped bare.
Together, these initiatives represent a multi-pronged approach: tourism, renewable energy, agriculture, and forestry all layered onto a former mining landscape.Fragile gainsYet, the revival is far from secure.
The women who operate the boats say they bear much of the financial burden themselves, paying monthly fees and covering maintenance costs. Infrastructure remains patchy, and promotional efforts are limited.
A nightly light show, once a key attraction, has been non-functional for months due to technical issues. Visitor numbers fluctuate, and without sustained investment, growth remains uncertain.
Officials from SECL have recently visited the site the first such inspection in years but concrete plans for expansion or maintenance have yet to be detailed.“Currently, it is managed by the district authority,” said an SECL official, adding that improvements are under consideration.
For locals, the concern is that without consistent support, the project could stagnate another chapter in a long history of promises tied to the land.
As night deepens over Kenapara, Rajak continues his patrol, the beam of his torch tracing slow arcs across the water. The quiet is punctuated only by the creak of boats and distant voices.
He has seen this land through its many phases farmland, mine, and now a tentative experiment in renewal. Each transformation has brought both opportunity and loss.“I’ve seen how things end here,” he says.
“This time, let it not end.”His words capture the delicate balance of India’s mine-to-eco-park model. It is a story of resilience and reinvention, but also of unfinished transitions.
The lakes may be calm, the trees slowly returning, and the boats moving again but beneath the surface lies a deeper question: can these reclaimed landscapes truly sustain the communities that once depended on coal?
For now, the answer drifts somewhere between the past and the promise of what these waters might yet become.
