Goemkarponn Desk
PANAJI: Chief Minister Pramod Sawant today said that mining and all other activities will begin from this year.
“Mining and all related activities will begin from this year. In my opinion, this is the best time to invest in the mining business,” said Sawant
He further said that his government wants to promote sustainable mining.
“In the next 7-8 years mining sector will be running on full capacity,” he added
Sawant said that Goa cabinet has approved a policy to allow the sale of mining dumps, materials that were once considered as waste, bringing huge relief for leaseholders in the natural resource rich southern state of India.
Chief minister Pramod Sawant had said the policy was approved at a recent meeting of the state cabinet, but it is yet to be notified.
“With this, the policy to begin mining from dumps can begin. The state will also earn some revenue,” Sawant said.
In December last year, the Goa government said it completed the first phase of the auction of mining blocks with four companies winning bids for the extraction of ore from different mineral-rich stretches of the coastal state.
He said that the state will collect additional revenue to the tune of ₹ 300-350 crore in the form of concessional fees when these four mining blocks start functioning.
Sawant said that the process of issuing environment clearances by the state government would be expedited.
The chief minister said the policy to auction the existing iron ore dumps in the state will be announced next month.
He told the House that iron ore to the tune of 700 million tonnes is stocked in the form of dumps across the state.
The CAG in its report had called on the DMG to put in place an automated system to capture the data of supply/dispatch of resources linking the data for use of various agencies such as weigh-bridges, mobile checking, geo- surveillance, check-posts, exit gates, railway sidings, resellers, user agencies, industries, etc.
“The system should provide for drawing samples from the extractions of minerals for assessment of the quality and grade of minerals and verify the correctness of the percentage of lumps and fines declared by the lessees in order to ensure that royalty remitted by lessees are at appropriate rate,” the report recommended.
