Odisha to sign MoU with MSTC for e-auction of minerals

Electronic sale of minerals from odisha likely to begin from Jan 2013

The Odisha government will enter into a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Kolkata-based MSTC Ltd for selling of key bulk minerals like iron ore, manganese and chrome ore on the e-auction platform.

The MoU would outline the roles, responsibilities, scope of work and remuneration for MSTC. A suitable government order will be issued, making e-auction compulsory.

Electronic sale of minerals from Odisha is likely to begin from January 2013.

The state government had recently formed a five-member panel headed by steel & mines secretary Rajesh Verma to decide the roadmap for e-auction.

The panel will also have director (mines) Deepak Mohanty, chairman and managing director of state controlled Odisha Mining Corporation Saswat Mishra and one representative (not below the rank of additional secretary) each from the law and finance departments as members. It is slated to have its maiden meeting on November 22.

The state government, through a recent notification, had stated that a decision has been taken for introduction of electronic sale of iron ore, manganese and chrome ore by all lessees and licensees in order to bring transparency and improvement in the existing system as well as to generate more revenues.

“E-auction would be a progressive measure to curb illegal mining”, the notification further stated.

E-auction will fist begin with iron ore and will be later extended to chrome and manganese ore. Electronic sale of different grades of iron ore is set to rake in incremental revenue of Rs 400 crore per year for the state government. Mining revenue contributed Rs 4517 crore to the state exchequer in 2011-12 of which iron ore had the lion's share of nearly 70 per cent.

MSTC would set up its office in Bhubaneswar for coordination and execution of e-auction related work. All users of e-auction platform will have to register with the MSTC website either as buyer or seller. Registration of buyers and sellers will be a continuous process. Users from the Odisha government will be provided with a master password by MSTC for monitoring purpose.

The sellers would forward the list of material with all details to MSTC in soft copy for creating online auction catalogue. The details would include the reserve price to be fixed by the seller. The reserve price would be the start price for the e-auction.

MSTC will schedule e-auction in consultation with the seller. Only those companies which are registered with the Odisha government as consignees are eligible to participate in the e-auction subject to their getting registered with the MSTC website and submission of requisite earnest money deposit.