New Delhi – Steel Authority of India Ltd doesn’t have any plans to bid for the iron ore mine auctions in 2020 as it has enough reserves, the company’s chairman said on the sidelines of an event marking the company’s 60th anniversary.
“We have reserves of 3.7 billion tonnes. It is sufficient to take care of our requirements,” Anil Kumar Chaudhary, chairman of SAIL said.
SAIL has set an expansion target of 50 million tonnes by 2030-31 from its current capacity of 21 million tonnes and plans a greenfield and brownfield expansion.
SAIL currently has seven iron ore mines in India and is the second largest iron ore miner in the country.
Chaudhary spoke about the coal mine auctions in the recent past where the government gave it an entitlement to get mines on a ‘dispensation basis’ for being a state run company, but didn’t say if it will get a similar benefit for iron ore mine auctions.
Approximately 50 iron ore mines are coming up for auctions via a competitive bidding method by March 2020 as mining leases are expiring at that time, but the states are expected to kick off the process for the auctions by August of 2019.
By Ruchira Singh
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