Bids invited for limestone block in Gadchiroli spread over 250 ha forest land

Nagpur: The state’s directorate of mining and geology has once again invited bids for a major limestone block in the Maoist affected Gadchiroli district. The last date for submitting the technical and initial price bids was November 1. There have been two attempts earlier to auction this block during the year with no response.
The Devalmari-Katepally block is located in Aheri tehsil of the district. It is spread over 500 hectares. Out of this 260 hectares is forest land. Some 250 hectares is private holding, including Devalmari and Katepally villages, which may have to be rehabilitated. The rest is government land, says the summary document. The mine has 149 million tonnes of limestone out of which 87 million tonnes is cement grade.
Sources say the block has one of the high grades of limestone. With as much as 52% content, the limestone could be much sought after by cement industries.
Besides iron ore, Gadchiroli district has rich reserves of limestones, which the state would be putting up for auction. Prior to this bids were invited in January and April for the block. The state is auctioning 11 blocks spread over different parts of this tranche said the notice issued in October.
Earlier in the year Vedanta Group bagged a composite license for copper block spread over Gadchiroli and Chandrapur districts. The company is at present carrying out prospecting, which means the reserves are being ascertained. Once found to be feasible, the mining licence would be utilized. The company has three years for prospecting. So far prospecting has been limited to Chandrapur district, with Gadchiroli yet to be covered, said a source.
The directorate is also carrying out the process of updating the data on iron ore reserves in Gadchiroli district according to the United Nations Framework Classification (UNFC). This is a universally accepted system of evaluating mineral resources. After this, more iron ore mines would be put up for auction.
The directorate already has old data on the reserves. However, after that further exploration has been carried out. Now the same data is being recast under the UNFC norms. This would lead to transparency in the system as the UNFC evaluation is acceptable everywhere.
At present Lloyds Metals and Energy Limited (LMEL) is the only company operating an iron ore mine in the area. It had got the block under the old allotment regime. Before this, almost half a dozen companies were allotted iron ore blocks in the district. All except that of LMEL were taken back as none had completed prospecting. Now fresh mines will be only auctioned.