Leases of inactive mines to be cancelled automatically

Jaipur: Mine leases of major minerals allotted on reserved land will be automatically cancelled if mining activities have not been undertaken or stopped for the past two years.
ACS (mines and petroleum) Subodh Agrawal on Tuesday said these mines will be auctioned by the state government immediately as per the new MMDR rules. He said that the central government has issued orders to this effect.
Aggarwal said according to the necessary provisions made by the central government in the MMDR Act 1957, mining areas reserved for state government companies or undertakings, where mining has been done continuously for the past two years, one-year mining will be allowed to continue. Such undertakings will have to issue mining leases within a year.
In the same way, under the then Rule 58 of the Mineral Concession Rules, 1960, the state government has issued temporary mining work permits in the reserved mining areas for companies or undertakings.
Where production has started and mining operations have not been stopped for two years, the state government will issue mining permission for a grace period of one year in respect of the lease. He said it would be necessary for such permission holders to obtain mining lease within a year.
He said these new provisions issued by the Centre will not apply to atomic and hydrocarbon energy minerals. Aggarwal said this order is aimed at scientific exploitation of mineral wealth, sustainable development, opening of mining operations by auctioning unnecessarily closed mines, increasing means of employment and income in the national interest.
He said this would pave the way for the auction of closed major mineral mines.