India's coal demand will go up to 1,000 million tonnes (MT) by the end of the 12th Five Year Plan (2012-17), necessitating about 200 MT of imports to bridge the shortfall in domestic output, said a senior Planning Commission official.

Arguing that indiscriminate exploitation of mineral resources was leading to alienation amongst local tribal populations and furthering the cause of Naxalite groups, Minister for Tribal Affairs V Kishore Chandra Deo has advocated a ban on export of raw materials like iron ore or bauxite. Mineral resources like iron ore should be declared "national wealth" and their use must be regulated in the larger interest of the country, Deo said in an interview.

Karnataka has imposed Rs 140 crore in penalties on 13 iron ore mining companies in Tumkur for encroaching on government land and dumping mineral waste, thereby causing damage to the environment. "We have conducted a suo motu joint survey with the departments of mines and geology, forest and revenue in Tumkur district and found that 13 iron ore mining companies have violated the Karnataka Land Revenue Act, 1964, by dumping mineral waste on government land," C Somashekhar, deputy commissioner of Tumkur, said.

Anil Ambani's flagship power company does not want to stop at just being a leading power generator. It is aspiring to emerge as a leading coal miner as well. At a time when fuel linkage has been crippling growth plans for most of its peers, Reliance Power (R-Power) may soon rub shoulders with top coal producers of the world.

A cash-strapped Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation (UPPCL) has signed a one-year deal with a private power generator in Gujarat, routed through a private power trader in the western state, to buy some 600 MW at around Rs 4.70 a unit. The price is well above the average of less Rs 3 a unit on the power exchanges over the last two months.

India's largest iron ore miner Navaratna company NMDC is now on a shopping spree. It has been traversing the continents looking for precious mineral assets for use in India for some time now. As a part of this effort, NMDC has tied up with the Russian steel producer Severstal.

JSW Steel has already made investments of over Rs 33,500 crore to set up a 10 million tonne per annum capacity steel plant in the state of Karnataka based upon the MOU signed by government of Karnataka and the assurance of mining concessions to JSW Steel.

While New Delhi is busy framing a mining friendly rule in its belief that exploiting the nation's natural resource at a fast rate will lead to faster economic growth, the mineral-rich states are busy looking the other way to encourage the private profiteers to plunder the natural resource for their personal profit.

Centralise iron ore mining under NMDC.

The Lokayukta report recorded how the miners rigged every rule in book and encashed the 'China boom'.