Centre may question Odisha on delay in disposing mineral applications

The huge pendency in disposal of mineral concession applications may be a cause of embarassment for the state government at the upcoming meet of the central empowered cum coordination committee (CEC) on September 18.

The meeting convened by the central mines ministry will inter alia stress on timelines for disposal of mineral concession applications. In its letter to the state governments in June, the ministry called for suggesting timelines for each step in the processing of mineral concession proposals.

This will not only make the system transparent with self-imposed timelines, but will also create confidence in the industry, the ministry held.

Such timelines are required for monitoring and processing the mineral concessions through a web based portal in consultation with the Project Monitoring Subgroup of the Cabinet Committee on Investment (CCI).

In Odisha, 3705 mineral concession (MC) applications are pending for disposal. This includes 37 RP (reconnaissance permit), 1943 PL (prospecting license) and 1725 ML (mining lease) applications. The applications of 250 mining leases are waiting to be disposed off. The state government has not submitted the quarterly report on status of mines and MC applications after March 2013.

Due to delay in processing of MC applications, especially the ones seeking renewal, the leases carry on operations under deemed renewal and at times, this leads to incidence of illegal mining.

As per reports submitted by the state governments, there is huge pendency of MC and renewal applications. According to these reports, a total of 63,946 applications (645 RP applications, 20,088 PL applications and 43,216 ML applications) are pending with the state governments.

The meeting will also discuss on an action plan for legal and responsible mining. This can be ensured by framing transparent mining system for lease approval and renewal by utilising technology applications, strictly enforcing MMDR (Mines & Minerals- Development & Regulation) Act, developing mining tenement system to e-enable the processes associated with mining concession regime and facilitating lessees by processing for environment clearance and forest clearance in a transparent and expeditious manner.

The meeting would take stock of action taken by states to curb illegal mining, updated action taken on Shah Commission's reports on illegal mining and updation in mineral concession approval system.