The Supreme Court on Monday lifted the ban imposed by it last year on Category A iron ore mines in Karnataka, but with stringent conditions. The order follows the acceptance of a report of the Central Empowered Committee (CEC), which had recommended relaxation of the prohibition as they have caused least harm to the environment. These include 21 mines which are operational and 24 non-operational mines.
However, there is no relief for Category B and C mines, which have devastated the region through illegal mining. The CEC had visited the state and examined the ecological damage done by unrestricted mining and made several reports to the Court. The reports have painted a dismal picture of the region.
After marathon hearings spread over several months, the Court had banned mining operations in three districts — Bellary, Chitradurga and Tumkur. With today’s order passed by a forest bench headed by Justice Aftab Alam, mining companies received some relief. The court has, however, insisted on the lessees fulfiling all statutory requirements like getting certificates from forest and environmental authorities. Monitoring of the ground situation also will continue. The Court has not finally disposed of the batch of petitions and would hear these in due course of time.
Impact on the steel industry
Even though the apex court has allowed resumption of mining, the raw material supply situation is unlikely to improve in the immediate future. The steel industry might have to wait for some more months to see a steady supply of iron ore for their blast furnaces, as majority of the mines are yet to secure various statutory approvals before resuming operations.
After getting approval for the reclamation and rehabilitation (R&R) Plans from the CEC, the mining leases are required to secure other statutory approvals, such as environment clearance and forest clearance from the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF), mine plan or scheme of mining from the Indian Bureau of Mines and consent for operation (CFO) from the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board. The entire process is likely to take about six months to one year for various leases.
All 18 mines in Category A, whose R&R Plans have been approved, are together permitted to produce about 8.02 million tonnes (mt) of iron ore annually. However, one of these mines is not willing to obtain statutory approvals and five others are not eligible to restart mining due to some other cases pending against them. So, the balance 12 mines can restart as and when they get approvals and they together can bring about 4.56 mt of iron ore to the market.
Meanwhile, only one mining lease, Mineral Enterprises Limited (MEL), has all statutory approvals in place and is ready to restart mining immediately. MEL has been fixed a limit of extracting 380,000 tonnes of iron ore annually (as per dumping volume available) as against its earlier sanctioned plan of one mt per annum (mtpa).
“We have all the clearances in place and got CFO from the department of mines and geology, government of Karnataka. We will start mining operations at our mine in Chitradurga district once we get the court order copy in hand,” said Basant Poddar, managing director, MEL. However, MEL’s mining lease expires on October 6, 2012 and it plans to extract about 200,000 tonnes in one month before shutting operations.
“We are planning to approach the state government for a temporary work permit for six months before we get our lease renewed for longer tenure,” Poddar said.
Out of remaining 17 mines, whose R&R Plans have been accepted by CEC, two mines, R Praveenchandra and VESCO, require at least one month to obtain pending statutory approvals like scheme of mining and consent for operations. These mines together can produce about 940,000 tonnes.
Other five mines, B Kumara Gowda, Nadeem Minerals, Tiffins Barytes Asbestos and Paints Limited, Zeenath Transport and Sri Gavisiddeswara Minerals require about two months to obtain the scheme of mining and consent for operation. These mines together can produce 2.31 mtpa. Two mining leases of SMIORE require about three months to secure all approvals and they can together produce about 740,000 tonnes.
Shanthi Priya Minerals has a capacity to produce 130,000 tonnes and requires about six months to secure all approvals. Gadigi Minerals Mining requires one year to obtain all approvals. One mining lease, Allum Prashanth, is not willing to obtain statutory approvals.
The remaining five mining leases in Category A are currently not eligible to restart mining as the CEC is either reverifying their survey sketches or certain other cases are pending against them.
