India’s state-run NMDC Limited has once again missed the deadline for the commissioning of its greenfield steel mill project, setting a new date at the end of June for commissioning, company sources said on Tuesday, May 30.
They said that the ministry of steel had set a deadline of March 31, 2023, for commissioning of the 3 million mt per annum steel mill under construction in Chhattisgarh state, so that the government could hasten the planned and approved process of privatization of the steel mill.
But the company had missed the commissioning deadline of March 31 and also the subsequently revised deadline at the end of May, sources said.
According to a company official, there was “more confidence” in achieving commissioning at the end of June since the ancillaries of the mill like the coke oven batteries, the central power plant, the power blowing unit and the oxygen plant are already in operation.
He said that the blast furnaces are in the final stages of installation and will be fired in mid-June and that hot metal output is expected by the end of the month.