The Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to hear on January 3 a writ petition for urgent measures to rescue 15 miners trapped in a rat-hole mine in Meghalaya. Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi said the petition, which was orally mentioned by senior advocate Anand Grover for petitioner Aditya N. Prasad, would be listed for Thursday, even as a rescue operation is under way in the State. Besides seeking a standard operating procedure for rescue in mines, the petition said the court should ask the government to utilise the services of the technical arms of the forces in the rescue operation immediately. The petition sought the requisitioning of high-capacity pumps, including those built by the Kirloskar Brothers Ltd., which were offered to the government of Thailand in June/July last year when schoolboys and their teacher were rescued from a cave.
