The government of the Indian state of Goa has applied to India’s Supreme Court for permission to reduce the base price for iron ore auctions and to offer discounts to address poor response from buyers, a senior Goa government official said on Monday, October 12.
The official said that the Supreme Court was approached to reduce the mandatory base price of INR 500/mt ($7.73/mt) for low grade iron ore fines and to enable the local government to offer a discount on the final price at the auctions.
The Indian Supreme Court has been monitoring illegal mining in the western state of Goa and as much as 16 million mt of illegally mined fines has been seized by the government and lies idle across dumps in the region.
Under the supervision of the court, the Goa government was permitted to sell off the dump stocks through the auction route but at a minimum base price of INR 500/mt as laid down by the Supreme Court. However, there have been very few takers at the 11 rounds of auction held so far for around 6-7 million mt of the total 16 million mt, the official said.