Vedanta Alumina gets mining rights for Lanjigarh project
Published by MAC on 2004-10-10Vedanta Alumina gets mining rights for Lanjigarh project
Bhubaneswar By Prakash Rao & Dhirendra Mishra
October 10, 2004
The Orissa Government cleared mining rights to Vedanta Alumina for its integrated aluminum plant in Lanjigarh of Kalahandi district. On October 5th, the Orissa Mining Corporation (OMC) entered into mining lease agreement with Vedanta for the Lanjigarh and the Karlapat (in Rayagada district) bauxite mines.
The One million tonne capacity alumina plant will come up in the next three years. The project is promoted by the Sterlite Group. The agreement has, effectively, cleared the path for expediting the project work.
The agreement between OMC and Vedanta is emphatic on hastening of leasing affair and supply of rich and adequate quantity of Bauxite ore to Vedanta. It has also made provisions to procure other qualitatively superior mines containing more than 25 million tonnes of ore in case the Karlapat mine exploration does not materialize.
Karlapat has been identified as one of the largest deposits of rich Bauxite ores, which alumina majors such as Indal in Hirakud, Nalco in Damanjodi and the proposed Utkal Alumina in Rayagada have been lobbying for.
It is worth mentioning that earlier, Sterlite had entered into a MoU with the Orissa Government for another aluminum plant at Jharsuguda for which, too, the recent agreement has got mining provisions. This plant has also been shown to become operational in three years time.