Jharkhand State Mineral Development Corporation is hell-bent on playing the lead role in the keenly watched auction of the Ajitaburi iron ore deposit.
Eight out of 24 companies qualified as technical bidders. State-owned JSMDC beat them all with an initial price offer of 122 percent leaving one of the country’s biggest private miners Rungta Mines far behind at 92 percent and DD Steel and Power at 92.4 percent.
Its participation now seems to have postponed the forward bidding process scheduled for 19 July 2021. According to media reports a petition in court challenges the state corporation’s participation on grounds that it had not filed its financial results in the last few years and did not qualify.
People have also questioned whether K Srinivasan’s role as secretary of the state department of mines and geology overseeing auctions and as Chairman and MD of JSMDC, which seems to be very keen on this deposit, was not a conflict of interest.
The government’s move to reserve seven iron ore mines in the West Singhbhum district in favour of JSMDC had been strongly opposed by its political opponents and the Centre. It was accused of trying to benefit mining contractors at the cost of the state which stood to earn high premiums from auctioning these areas. One of those seven mines, Thakurani iron mine, earlier run by Padma Kumar Jain, remains a hot subject. State BJP president Deepak Prakash and former Chief Minister Madhu Koda (who has starred in more than one mining controversy himself) have accused the state of conniving with the lessee in settling dues and estimating reserves.
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