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Tribune News Service
New Delhi, July 4
The government today launched the National Mineral Exploration Policy (NMEP), which prescribes for incentivising the participation of private companies in exploration.
Under the policy, private agencies would be engaged to carry out exploration with the right to a certain share in the revenue (by way of royalty/premium to be accrued to the state government) from the successful bidder of mineral block after e-auction, which will be discovered by that private explorer.
The revenue sharing could be either in the form of a lump sum or an annuity, to be paid throughout the period of mining lease, with transferable rights.
The government will also work out normative cost of exploration works for different kinds of minerals so that the exploration agencies could be compensated, in case they could not discover any mineable reserves in their respective areas.
This will be an added incentive for exploration agencies to mitigate their risk of exploration. The selection of private explorer is proposed to be done following a transparent process of competitive bidding.
Officials pointed out that although the country is endowed with large mineral resource and has geological environment for many others on account of similarity of geological set up with Australia, South Africa, South America, but survey and exploration have been broadly concentrated on the surface and shallow mineral deposits.
Exploration for deep and concealed deposits is a cost-intensive and high-risk enterprise which requires state-of-the-art technology and expertise.
The MMDR Amendment Act, 2015 has brought in transparency in the allocation of mineral concessions in terms of Prospecting Licence and Mining Lease. The present regime of grant of mineral concessions provides for Non Exclusive Reconnaissance Permit (NERP) which does not allow seamless transitions to prospecting and mining licences.
On account of this, the private sector does not seem to be enthused to take up high risk of exploration.
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