BHUBANESWAR: The State Government on Wednesday issued notification inviting tender for e-auction of iron ore mines under the amended Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) (MMDR) Act, 2015.
This will be the first auction of iron ore block in the State. The Government has decided to auction Ghoraburahani-Sagasahi East iron ore mines in Koira circle of Sundargarh district with a reserve of around 100 million tonnes.
With the issue of the notification, sale of the tender documents also started from Wednesday.
“The willing bidders will be asked to submit their queries, if any, by January 15 and a pre-bid conference will be held on January 20 in which transaction adviser, Principal Secretary of Steel and Mines department will remain present and clarify their doubts,” Director of Mines Deepak Mohanty told reporters.
Modification in tender documents, if any, will be done by February 2 and February 5 is the last date for sale of tender papers, he said.
The bidding report would be submitted to the Directorate of Mines by February 10.
While financial bids are invited in digital format only, technical bids are invited both in digital and physical format from eligible bidders.
“We will take another 10 days for the technical evaluation of the bidding report and auction process will be finished by March 20,” Mohanty said.
The iron ore block will be offered in the form of a composite licence- prospecting licence (PL)-cum-mining licence (ML), he said.
The auction platform is provided by MSTC Ltd, Government of India concern while SBI Capital Markets Ltd (SBI Caps), a fully owned subsidiary of State Bank of India, is the transaction adviser for conducting mineral e-auction. The transaction adviser will assist the State Government in fixing floor price for the auction.
Earlier, the State Government had proposed to auction two mines, including the Jhunka-Patriposi block in the first phase. While the required documents for e-auction of the Ghoraburahani-Sagasahi East iron ore block was approved by the Centre, the Jhunka-Patriposi block, which is at the G3 exploration stage, is yet to get Central clearance.
The State Government has already formed a committee under the Development Commissioner for smooth conduct of mines auction in the State. The committee’s mandate is to monitor the preparatory work relating to auction of major mineral concessions, including conduct of DGPS (Differential Global Positioning System) survey and preparation of tender documents.