Centre to states: Clear pending mines leases within time

Irked over slow progress in clearing mineral concession applications in states, the Centre has asked mineral-rich states to clear them "strictly within the time-frame stipulated" in rules.

The tardy pace of disposal of mineral concessions by states have resulted in 65,337 mineral concession applications pending in states, the Mines Ministry has said in a communication to states.

"There was a huge pendency of mineral concession applications. The pendency was quite high in almost all the mineral-rich states and the pace of disposal of cases was extremely slow," the communication said.

It asked states to apply provisions of the Mines and Mineral Development and Regulation Act, the rules and the guidelines framed thereunder carefully and correctly.

"Dispose of the cases strictly within the time-frame stipulated in the Mineral Concession Rules," it added.

The communication said it was a matter of concern that "a total of 65,337 applications (642 RP applications, 19,661 PL applications and 45,034 ML applications) were pending with the state governments."

As per the rules, there are provisions for disposal of Reconnaissance Permits (RP) within six months; Prospecting License (PL) within nine months and Mining Lease (ML) within 12 months. The ML is granted for undertaking operations for extracting minerals while PL is granted for undertaking operations for purpose of exploring.

RP, on the other hand is granted for preliminary prospecting of a mineral through regional, aerial and geophysical surveys. The Centre also asked states to refer to a Supreme Court order of September 2010, known as Sandur case, "which clearly explains the applicability of different provisions of the MMDR Act, 1957 in processing mineral concession proposals" for virgin areas, previously held areas, and non-notified areas.

Also, it said there is considerable delay on the part of the State Governments in sending proposals for prior approval of the central government in respect of virgin areas.

Besides, "notifications inviting applications for grant of concessions are kept open-ended, which does not help their timely processing and disposal," it said.

Meanwhile sources said, clearances to leases have slowed down due to various reasons, including a spurt in illegal mining cases with states reluctant in granting new leases.

About 99,000 cases of illegal mining were reported in 20 states in the last fiscal. In 2011-12, the number of cases stood at about 96,000 while the same were recorded at about 78,000 in 2010-2011.

This push by the Centre comes as a support to the iron ore sector which has been facing a slew of issues even as the production drops drastically in Karnataka by as much as 30 per cent. The mining sector got some sort of relief recently when the Supreme Court allowed opening of category-A and B mines in the major iron ore producing state of Karnataka, while ordering a complete closure of category-C mines.

Post this, the iron ore mining in Karnataka will take a minimum of two years to become fully operational after the Supreme Court verdict allowed resumption of mining at category-A & B mines in the state. An industry official has said that also, out of the 115 mines that will be eligible to re-start operations, as many as 35-40 are not likely to start operations due to various issues.

Federation of Indian Mineral Industries vice president Basant Poddar said that "It will take over two years for all the mines to be re-opened in the state and become fully operational. After they become functional, their production capacity will be around 25 million tonnes."