New Delhi, 21 Dec (KNN) The Union Minister of Steel Ram Chandra Prasad Singh, Chaired a meeting of the Consultative Committee of the Ministry of Steel today and all the members deliberated on the issue of “Development of manganese ore industry in India”.

Minister of State for  Steel and Rural Development Faggan Singh Kulaste and senior officers of the Ministry of Steel  and the CPSEs were also present during  the meeting according to the press release.

Those who participated during the deliberations included Members of Parliament Bidyut Baran Mahato, Chandra Prakash Choudhary, Janardan Singh Sigriwal, Prataprao Govindrao Patil Chikhlikar, S. Gnanathiraviam and Vijay Baghel.

Union Minister directed CPSEs under Ministry of Steel to take up the issue of manganese ore exploration with state Governments and to explore possibilities of new manganese bearing areas in India to boost the domestic production of manganese ore as per the National Steel Policy, 2017 which will help in achieving the objective of “Atma Nirbhar Bharat”.

As per the current progress, Steel sector in the country is likely to achieve a record production of 115 million metric tonnes this year, said the Union Minister.

During the meeting, a wide gamut of issues were covered, including usage of Manganese ore, Global scenario of manganese ore, Manganese production in India and Contribution of MOIL in country’s manganese Production and future Road map as per Steel demand in the country by 2030.

MOIL is contributing around 45% of domestic production and has drawn up plan to increase production upto 1.8 million MT by year 2024-25 and 3.5 million MT by year 2030.

Members of the committee suggested exploration and survey of minerals in Jharkhand, Odisha and Karnataka and that a Research & Development team be constituted to work out the possibility of usage of manganese in E-vehicles batteries.