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The Ministry of Mines held a roadshow in Raipur on the 8th Tranche of the auction of Critical and Strategic Mineral Blocks, with Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Vishnu Deo Sai as chief guest and Minister of State for Coal and Mines Satish Chandra Dubey in attendance.
Mines Secretary Keshav Chandra said 56 of the 88 critical and strategic mineral blocks offered so far have been successfully auctioned.
The 8th Tranche comprises 20 blocks across nine states - 17 Composite Licences and 3 Mining Leases - of which five are in Chhattisgarh.
Minerals on offer include graphite, rare earth elements, rare metals, vanadium, gallium, titanium, molybdenum, tungsten, potash, phosphorite and glauconite.
The technical session covered the NMEDT scheme that partially reimburses exploration expenses to Composite Licence holders, followed by briefings from MECL on block potential, SBICAPS on the tender document and MSTC on the e-auction process.
Build a resilient domestic value chain for critical minerals, covering exploration, mining, beneficiation, processing and recovery from end-of-life products, and secure overseas assets. Approved by the Union Cabinet on 29 January 2025.
Key: Government expenditure of Rs 16,300 crore, with a further Rs 18,000 crore of investment expected from public sector undertakings, over seven years from 2024-25 to 2030-31. The Ministry of Mines is the administrative ministry.
Identify, acquire, explore and develop strategic mineral assets abroad for India's commercial needs - the overseas arm of the same mineral-security strategy the domestic auctions serve.
Key: Incorporated on 8 August 2019 as a joint venture of NALCO, Hindustan Copper Ltd and Mineral Exploration Company Ltd in a 40:30:30 equity ratio, under the Ministry of Mines. It has secured five brine-lithium exploration blocks in Catamarca province, Argentina, part of South America's 'lithium triangle'.
Partially reimburse exploration expenses incurred by Composite Licence holders, lowering the risk that deters private bidders from taking blocks whose deposits are only partially proved.
Key: Presented at the roadshow by the Director General of NMEDT; it addresses the specific reason Composite Licence blocks attract fewer bidders than ready-to-mine Mining Leases.
The parent statute for mineral concessions in India. Critical and strategic minerals reserved for central auction are listed in Part D of the First Schedule; 24 of the 30 minerals identified as critical by a Ministry of Mines committee in November 2022 sit there.
Empowered the Central Government to exclusively auction mining leases and composite licences for the Part D critical minerals, with the auction revenue still accruing to the state government concerned. It also declassified six minerals - lithium, beryllium (and beryl), niobium, titanium, tantalum and zirconium - as atomic minerals, opening them to private exploration and mining for the first time.
The 2023 amendment created a new Exploration Licence covering 29 minerals in this schedule, including gold, silver, copper, cobalt, nickel, lead, potash and rock phosphate, allowing private explorers to undertake reconnaissance and prospecting.
A Mining Lease is granted over a block whose deposit has already been explored to a proven level - the winner can move towards production. A Composite Licence, formally a prospecting licence-cum-mining lease, is a single two-stage concession over a block that is only partially explored: the holder first prospects, and if a workable deposit is established, transitions into mining without applying afresh. That is why the 8th Tranche is weighted 17 Composite Licences to 3 Mining Leases - India's critical mineral blocks are mostly at an early exploration stage, and the composite route is what lets a private bidder take them on. It is also why the NMEDT reimbursement scheme matters: it offsets part of the exploration cost that a Composite Licence holder, unlike a Mining Lease holder, must bear before any revenue arrives.
Simple Analogy: A Mining Lease is buying a house ready to move into. A Composite Licence is buying a plot with a survey report and the right to build on it if the ground proves sound.
The country's principal geoscience agency, carrying out regional and detailed exploration that produces the geological reports on which mineral blocks are put to auction; founded on 4 March 1851, originally to locate coal for the railways
Central public sector undertaking for detailed mineral exploration and consultancy; briefed bidders at the roadshow on the blocks and their potential, and holds 30 per cent equity in KABIL
The state's mineral development arm; runs the TIN Portal for transparent payments to tribal tin collectors and holds 49 per cent in the NMDC-CMDC joint venture developing Bailadila Deposit-4
The government e-commerce public sector undertaking that runs the electronic auction platform on which mineral blocks are bid out; briefed prospective bidders on the e-auction process
Chhattisgarh is India's sole producer of tin concentrate, from cassiterite occurring in the pegmatites of the Bastar region - Dantewada, Bastar and Sukma districts - which is the background to the state corporation's TIN Portal for tribal tin collectors. The Bailadila range in Dantewada district holds some of the world's highest-grade haematite iron ore, mined by NMDC and, through the NMDC-CMDC joint venture, feeding NMDC's steel plant at Nagarnar. The state is also among India's leading producers of coal, dolomite and bauxite. Columbite, which CMDC said it is exploring, is the principal ore of niobium - one of the six minerals declassified as atomic by the MMDR Amendment Act, 2023.
REEs are a group of 17 elements - the 15 lanthanides plus scandium and yttrium - central to neodymium-iron-boron permanent magnets used in electric vehicle motors, wind turbines and defence systems. India holds large monazite beach-sand reserves processed by IREL (India) Limited, but its weakness lies downstream in separation, metallisation and magnet-making, which is what the NCMM's value-chain framing targets.
A mineral is classified as critical when it is essential to strategic sectors and its supply is concentrated in few countries or otherwise vulnerable - the clean-energy transition, electronics and defence all depend on minerals whose refining is dominated by a handful of producers. The label drives policy: Part D listing, central auction and the NCMM all follow from it.
Even though the Central Government exclusively auctions the Part D critical mineral blocks, the auction proceeds and royalty accrue to the state where the block lies. This is why state chief ministers actively court bidders at these roadshows - the Centre runs the auction, the state earns from it.
Mining districts fund local development through the District Mineral Foundation, established under a 2015 amendment to the MMDR Act, with its funds spent through the Pradhan Mantri Khanij Kshetra Kalyan Yojana - a direct link between new mineral blocks and welfare spending in tribal districts such as Dantewada.
GS Paper 3 > Indian Economy > Mineral Resources, Infrastructure and Energy Security
General Awareness > Indian Geography and Mineral Distribution
General Awareness > Government Schemes and Economy
Critical minerals have featured in successive prelims cycles since the 2023 MMDR amendment, usually as a statement-based question.
A mineral essential to economic and strategic sectors whose supply is vulnerable; India's committee identified 30 such minerals in November 2022, of which 24 are in Part D of the First Schedule of the MMDR Act.
A prospecting licence-cum-mining lease - a single concession letting the holder explore a partially-proved block and then move to mining without a fresh application.
The principal tin ore, occurring in the pegmatites of Chhattisgarh's Bastar region - the basis of India's only tin concentrate production.
The principal ore of niobium, one of the six minerals the MMDR Amendment Act, 2023 removed from the atomic minerals list.
The 15 lanthanides plus scandium and yttrium - 17 elements used in permanent magnets, EV motors, wind turbines and defence electronics.