“The provinces have identified 50 to 60 mineral blocks to be put up for auction. We expect provinces to issue notice inviting tenders (NITs) for 20 to 25 blocks within the next two to three months,” Mines Secretary Balvinder Kumar has said.
The blocks to go on auction would include gold, iron-ore, bauxite and limestone.
However, there was no clarity available on why the government was pushing ahead with a fresh round of auctions, despite earlier attempts not receiving a favourable response.
Since early 2016, when legislative changes empowered the provinces to auction noncoal mineral blocks, 47 mineral reserves had been put up for auction of which only six were successfully sold, while others failed to receive any acceptable bids.
The auctions of another 17 blocks were deferred even though NITs were issued, with the government citing the adverse business and investment environment as reasons for the deferral.
Kumar said that the government would soon announce offshore mineral mining rules and that about 50 offshore mining blocks would be auctioned in the next three to four months.
In a related development, the government’s plans to liberalise atomic mineral exploration and mining had run into opposition from private miners.
The government has circulated a draft document on atomic minerals concession rules for comments from various stakeholders. The document allowed provinces to conduct an auction for the extraction of atomic minerals below a certain threshold. The rules also stipulated that operations of private miners would be terminated if the atomic mineral content in specific concessions exceeded a minimum threshold and the mining right would cede to a government-owned and -operated mining entity.
However, the Beach Mineral Producers’ Association has slammed the draft rules. “The very concept of threshold limit value (TLV) is unscientific and seems to have been arrived at arbitrarily without fundamental principles. Basing the entire future of beach sand minerals industry on a single factor is lopsided and irrational.”
“The TLV criteria are purely to safeguard government organisations and hide their inefficiencies and ineffectiveness,” the statement said. Beach sand minerals in India generally include ilmenite, rutile, zircon, monazite and sillimanite with ilmenite being predominant, though most minerals occur together in most parts of the country.
Source: Mining Weekly
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