Vedanta seeks govt help for sourcing bauxite

BHUBANESWAR: Vedanta Aluminium on Tuesday sought the Orissa government's intervention for leasing out a bauxite mine in Kalahandi district, close to the company's alumina refinery at Lanjigarh.

Vedanta Aluminum chief operating officer Mukesh Kumar met top government officials including chief secretary B K Patnaik, impressing upon them to bail out the one-million-tonne refinery plant.

The Union environment ministry had late last year cancelled a proposed expansion at the refinery, alleging violation of environmental norms.

"We made a presentation before the officials on various issues regarding the refinery. We have already posted an accumulated loss of 2,800 crore as we are being forced to buy bauxite from the open market and have to run our plant at 70% of its capacity," Mr Kumar told ET.

"The area within 30 km radius from Lanjigarh houses around 800 million tonnes of bauxite. We will be able to operate our plant with expanded capacity for the next 35-40 years if around 35% of the bauxite reserve stored in Kalahandi region is allotted to us," he added.

Vedanta is also pursuing other major bauxite sites besides exploring smaller reserves in the region after the environment ministry denied stage-2 clearances to Niyamgiri mining project and the proposed expansion of the refinery.