The Ministry of Mines, Govt. of India has taken-up initiative and organizing ‘Annual Strategic Interaction Meeting (ASIM)’ to appraise the activities of the geoscience programs by the Ministry of Mines and its functionaries.
Dr. K Rajeswara Rao, IAS, Addl. Secretary, Ministry of Mines, Govt. of India has conceived the concept of interactive meetings as part of appraisal to all the State Govts.
Hyderabad is braced with esteemed Central Govt. Geo-Science Organizations i.e., Geological Survey of India (GSI), Mineral Exploration Corporation Ltd. (MECL), Atomic Mineral Directorate for Exploration & Research (AMD), Indian Bureau of Mines (IBM), National Geophysical Research Institute (NGRI), National Mineral Development Corporation Ltd. (NMDC), National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC), National Council for Cement & Building Materials (NCCBM) etc.
In Telangana the promotional and regulation of minerals is done by the Dept. of Mines & Geology as mineral administrative wing of the State besides Telangana State Mineral Development Corporation Ltd., a State PSU mostly for sand mining and Singareni Collieries Company Ltd., a Joint State PSU for Coal mining assisted by Telangana State Remote Sensing Application Centre etc.
The Dept. of Mines & Geology performs promotional-mineral investigation, mapping, survey, exploration; regulatory function-allotment of leases for various minerals. As such, the Dept. is the custodian of all mineral resources in the State.
The Dept. convenes State Geological Programming Board (SGPB) meetings annually with all the Central & State Geoscience Organizations to plan geological and mineralogical investigation and exploration to tap newer mineral resources in the State.
The present meeting is arranged as part of the programme to have interface on the activities of GSI, MECL, IBM and other geoscience agencies viz., AMD, NGRI, NMDC, NCCBM, NRSC and to facilitate interaction with the Chief Secretary of State Govt., the Prl. Secy., Mines Dept. and to review the status of geological investigation and exploration work taken-up by various Central & State Geoscience Agencies for overall development of mineral sector in the State.