BANGALORE (AFP) - An Indian judge investigating corrupt mining practices in a resource-rich southern state said Wednesday that illegal extraction had cost the govt $3.6b. He accused politicians in Karnataka, including the state's chief minister B.S. Yeddyurappa, of causing the losses from 2006 to 2010 through the illicit mining of iron ore, much of which is thought to have been shipped to China. Some $3.6b "has been lost to the exchequer between 2006 and 2010 due to the illegalities and irregularities linked to the grant of licences and the export of iron ore," Judge Santosh Hegde said in state capital Bangalore.