CM welcomes Centre's decision to increase royalty on minerals

Chief Minister Raman Singh today thanked the Centre for increasing royalty rates on minerals and said it will boost up the annual mineral revenue collection of the state to over Rs 4,000 crore in the current fiscal.
Singh thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his Cabinet's decision to raise the royalty rate on iron ore from 10 per cent to 15 per cent of the selling price, an official release here said.
The decision will increase the annual mineral revenue collection of mineral-rich states, particularly iron-ore producers, it said.
In the last financial year 2013-14, the state government had collected a total revenue of Rs 958 crore 57 lakh (from iron-ore) in minerals.

In this duration, the state had an average royalty collection of Rs 300 per ton, Director, Geology and Mining Anbalgan P said.
From September 2014, during the current fiscal, rate of royalty shall be increased by 5 per cent and hence, the rate of average royalty collection will reach nearly Rs 450 per ton.

It has been estimated that with the hike, revenue collection on iron-ore supply will reach nearly Rs 1,600 crore in the current financial year and in 2015-16, it will further increase to Rs 1,800 crore, he said.
Compared to the collection of previous financial year 2013-14, the iron-ore revenue collection this year is expected to increase by Rs 642 crore, he added.

Besides, a revenue of Rs 3,235.42 crore was collected from various kinds of minerals in the previous financial year 2013-14, which is expected to touch Rs 4,100 crore in the current financial year after hike in royalty rates, he said.
Earlier, Singh had requested Prime Minister Modi to decide the rate of mineral royalty on the basis of their market value and also to revise the iron-ore royalty rate in proportion to its present market price, in the larger interest of iron-ore producing states like Chhattisgarh.