The government has proposed that all PSU iron ore mines that came up for renewal after 2015 have to pay 1.5 times of royalty to the state governments, as per a proposed critical amendment of the MMDR Amendment Bill.
Presently the royalty is 15% of IBM’s ASP and the Central government has proposed an additional 22.5% to be paid to the concerned state governments, as in the case of the renewal for 20 years of NMDC’s contentious Donimalai iron ore mine in Karnataka.
It deserves mention that the “additional amount”, which is 1.5 times of the royalty, will be applicable in case of NMDC’s iron ore mines in Chhattisgarh too.
Moreover, the non-operational auctioned mines in Odisha – Guali and Jilling Langalota – that have been given over to state PSU miner OMC will also have to bear this additional amount.
However, there is no specific mention whether the additional amount being earmarked for PSU miners will be on a retrospective or prospective basis. Therefore, there is no clarity that NMDC’s Chhattisgarh mines, which recently received a renewal, will have to bear the additional amount.
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