The meeting of the Consultative Committee for the Ministry of Mines regarding working of Mineral Exploration Corporation Limited (MECL) was held under the Chairmanship of Shri Dinsha J. Patel, Minister of Mines.
Welcoming the Members of Parliament the Minister said that the detailed exploration of various mineral forms the base for mining of potential mineral deposits and utilization of the same for socio-economic growth of the nation and this work is being carried out by MECL expeditiously under it’s mission keeping in view the demand for various minerals and today’s deliberation would help in improving the performance of this PSU and it will get new direction, which in turn would facilitate delivering better results in mineral industry, year after year.
The Minister further said that during the last four decades, MECL has seen many ups and down. During the nineties, it faced server financial problems. Its financial restructuring was done by the Government in the year 2006. Therefore, it is continuously making profits. The performance of the company was Very Good during 2012-13, which has been the highest during the last 22 years. The Company has decided to pay dividend of more than Rs. 4.00 crore to the Government for the year 2012-13.
The Minister said that he was pleased to inform that recently MECL has made a new Corporate Plan. The Company has also drawn the road map for its sustainable growth and expansion which mainly includes enhancing productivity through adoption of modern techniques and reduction in cost of exploration and further strengthening of its order book position.
During this five year plan, the Minister said that MECL is procuring new equipments and machineries having latest technology through internal resources, so that, this PSU becomes capable of carrying out exploration at international level. During the year 2012, it has purchased two numbers of State of the Art drills of international standard capable of drilling up to 1500 mtrs, which are helping in improving the productivity in deep drilling.
As on date, MECL is working for various PSU’s in mining sector such as SAIL, CIL, RINL, NTPC, HCL,NALCO etc. and also working for private companies in all the mineral rich states in India. Recently, this PSU has successfully completed exploration for atomic minerals on behalf of AMD and for geothermal energy on behalf of DRDO. MECL has played an important role for detailed exploration of energy minerals (coal and lignite) in India and has made significant contribution for detailed exploration of copper, iron ore, bauxite, gold, lead and zinc etc.
The Members of the Parliament present in the meeting included Shri Deoraj Singh Patel, Lok Sabha, Dr. Bhushan Lal Jangde and Smt. G. Sudharani, Rajya Sabha.
Shri Rajen Habib Khwaja, Secretary, Ministry of Mines, along with senior officers of the Ministry and GSI also attended the meeting.