Ministry
Ministry of Mines
The Ministry of Mines is the Union government department that regulates the survey, exploration and mining of India's non-fuel, non-atomic minerals and administers the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957. It is the seat of power over who may explore and extract minerals on Indian soil and offshore, and since 2023 it has become the institutional home of India's critical-minerals push through the National Critical Mineral Mission and the auction of lithium, rare-earth and other strategic mineral blocks. It owns the Geological Survey of India, the Indian Bureau of Mines, and the public-sector miners NALCO, Hindustan Copper and MECL.
Updated
- Administers
- Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957 — all minerals except coal, lignite, petroleum, natural gas and atomic minerals
- Attached / subordinate offices
- Geological Survey of India (founded 1851, Kolkata); Indian Bureau of Mines (Nagpur)
- Public-sector undertakings
- NALCO, Hindustan Copper Ltd, Mineral Exploration & Consultancy Ltd; KABIL (overseas JV)
- National Critical Mineral Mission outlay
- ₹34,300 crore over seven years, 2024-25 to 2030-31 (Cabinet, Jan 2025)
- Critical minerals identified
- 30 (Ministry of Mines expert committee, 2023)
- Headquarters
- Shastri Bhawan, New Delhi
Role
The Ministry of Mines is the Union government department that governs the survey, exploration and extraction of India’s non-fuel, non-atomic minerals. It administers the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957 and the mineral-concession and auction rules made under it, and through them decides who may prospect and mine, on what terms, and at what royalty. Coal and lignite sit with a separate Ministry of Coal, petroleum and natural gas with the Ministry of Petroleum, and atomic minerals with the Department of Atomic Energy — a division of labour that matters for reading India’s mineral policy, because “mining” news often spans three different institutions. The Ministry’s technical arms are the Geological Survey of India, which maps and explores, and the Indian Bureau of Mines, which regulates mining operations and mineral conservation; its commercial arms are the public miners NALCO, Hindustan Copper and MECL, and the overseas joint venture KABIL.
Since 2023 the Ministry has become the institutional centre of India’s critical-minerals strategy. The MMDR Amendment of that year reserved 24 critical and strategic minerals for central auction and created a new Exploration Licence; the National Critical Mineral Mission, approved in 2025, wraps exploration, auctions, overseas acquisition, recycling and stockpiling into a single seven-year programme. This has pulled the Ministry into adjacency with the energy transition (Ministry of Power), electronics and semiconductors, the fiscal levers of the Ministry of Finance on customs duty, and the geopolitics of China dependence and strategic autonomy. The office-holders change; the mandate over the ground does not.
Desk maintained by IndiaStand editorial cycles. Officeholders are transient; this dossier tracks the institution.
Timeline since 1947
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Geological Survey of India founded
The GSI, established in 1851 and later the Ministry's attached office, becomes the country's principal mineral-exploration agency.
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Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act enacted
The MMDR Act becomes the framework statute the Ministry administers for all minerals except coal, lignite, petroleum and atomic minerals.
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MMDR Amendment introduces auction-based allocation
The 2015 amendment made competitive auction the standard method for granting mineral concessions, ending discretionary allotment.
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MMDR Amendment creates District Mineral Foundation and NMET
Alongside auction-based allocation, the 2015 amendment inserted Section 9B creating a District Mineral Foundation in every mining-affected district, funded by a share of royalty, and a National Mineral Exploration Trust funded by two percent of royalty to pay for regional and detailed exploration. It also extended mining leases from a maximum of 30 years to 50 years with no renewal, only re-auction.
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MMDR Amendment permits transfer of non-auctioned captive leases
The 2016 amendment allowed transfer of captive mining leases that had not been granted through auction, which the government framed as easing mergers and acquisitions in the sector.
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Mineral Laws (Amendment) Act removes prior-experience bar on auctions
Passed by the Lok Sabha on 6 March 2020 and the Rajya Sabha on 12 March 2020, the Act amended both the MMDR Act, 1957 and the Coal Mines (Special Provisions) Act, 2015; it dropped the requirement of prior mining experience for bidders in coal and lignite auctions, created a prospecting licence-cum-mining lease, and removed central approval for certain state-level mining permits.
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MMDR Amendment ends end-use restrictions on mines
Introduced on 15 March 2021 and passed by both Houses by 22 March 2021, the amendment removed the reservation of mines for specified end-uses, allowed captive mines to sell up to 50 percent of annual production on the open market, empowered the Centre to auction blocks where states miss deadlines, and lapsed the rights of pre-2015 concession holders with a reimbursement mechanism.
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District Mineral Foundations reach 622 districts under PMKKKY
The Ministry recorded District Mineral Foundations constituted in 622 districts across 23 states, with Rs 63,534.07 crore allocated and Rs 37,422.94 crore spent up to September 2022 under the Pradhan Mantri Khanij Kshetra Kalyan Yojana; of 2,52,995 sanctioned projects, 1,33,144 had been completed.
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GSI establishes 5.9 million tonne lithium inferred resource in Reasi
The Geological Survey of India reported a G3-stage inferred resource of 5.9 million tonnes of lithium ore in the Salal-Haimna area of Reasi district, Jammu and Kashmir, from field seasons 2020-21 and 2021-22, and handed the report to the Union Territory government. A further G4 reconnaissance programme in Reasi district was under way.
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MMDR Amendment Act 2023 opens critical minerals
Enacted in August 2023, the amendment reserved a list of 24 critical and strategic minerals for central-government auction, removed six minerals (including lithium) from the atomic-minerals list, and introduced the Exploration Licence; the Offshore Areas Mineral Act was amended in parallel.
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Offshore Areas Mineral Amendment mandates auction of seabed blocks
Passed by the Lok Sabha on 1 August and the Rajya Sabha on 3 August 2023, the amendment made competitive bidding compulsory for production leases and composite licences granted to private entities, replaced the 30-year renewable production lease with a flat 50-year term, cut the standard block size from five minutes to one minute of latitude and longitude, and reserved atomic minerals in offshore areas for government entities.
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Ministry launches first auction of critical and strategic minerals
The Ministry of Mines launched the first tranche e-auction of 20 critical and strategic mineral blocks across eight states, 16 for composite licence and four for mining lease, including two blocks carrying lithium; the last date for bid submission was set at 22 January 2024 and the process was to close within 103 days of launch.
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Supreme Court holds mineral taxation to be a state domain
The Supreme Court held that the power to tax minerals and ores rests exclusively with state governments, while Parliament retains the ability to set upper limits on that taxation — a reading that bears directly on royalty and cess levied over the MMDR framework the Ministry administers.
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KABIL signs Argentina lithium agreement
On 15 January 2024 KABIL signed an agreement with Catamarca's state miner CAMYEN for five lithium brine blocks (~15,703 ha), described by the government as India's first overseas lithium exploration-and-mining project by a government company.
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Cabinet approves National Critical Mineral Mission
On 29 January 2025 the Union Cabinet approved the NCMM with a ₹34,300 crore outlay over seven years, which the Cabinet's approval framed as ₹16,300 crore of budgetary support and ₹18,000 crore of investment attributed to public-sector undertakings.
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58 firms cleared under critical-mineral recycling scheme
The Ministry of Mines approved 58 companies as eligible under the ₹1,500 crore Incentive Scheme for Promotion of Critical Mineral Recycling (notified 2 October 2025 under the National Critical Mineral Mission); 20 firms were cleared on 30 March 2026 and 38 on 29 April 2026, carrying about ₹5,000 crore of pledged investment.
Frequently asked
- What is Ministry of Mines?
- The Ministry of Mines is the Union government department that regulates the survey, exploration and mining of India's non-fuel, non-atomic minerals and administers the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957. It is the seat of power over who may explore and extract minerals on Indian soil and offshore, and since 2023 it has become the institutional home of India's critical-minerals push through the National Critical Mineral Mission and the auction of lithium, rare-earth and other strategic mineral blocks. It owns the Geological Survey of India, the Indian Bureau of Mines, and the public-sector miners NALCO, Hindustan Copper and MECL.
- When was Ministry of Mines established?
- Ministry of Mines was established 1947.
- What does Ministry of Mines do?
- Its remit covers Administration of the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957, Survey and exploration of minerals other than coal, lignite, petroleum, natural gas and atomic minerals, Regulation of mines and mineral development, including mineral concession and auction rules, Critical and strategic minerals: identification, auction and the National Critical Mineral Mission, Offshore-areas mineral development and regulation, Oversight of NALCO, Hindustan Copper, MECL and the overseas JV KABIL.
- What is the latest on Ministry of Mines?
- As of 2026-07-06: 58 firms cleared under critical-mineral recycling scheme. The Ministry of Mines approved 58 companies as eligible under the ₹1,500 crore Incentive Scheme for Promotion of Critical Mineral Recycling (notified 2 October 2025 under the National Critical Mineral Mission); 20 firms were cleared on 30 March 2026 and 38 on 29 April 2026, carrying about ₹5,000 crore of pledged investment.
Official sources
The government's own pages for this institution — go straight to the primary.
- Official website
mines.gov.in
- Ministry of Mines site
Canonical ministry home; charter covers survey/exploration of all minerals except natural gas, petroleum and atomic minerals, plus non-ferrous metals.
mines.gov.in/webportal/home
- Geological Survey of India department
Attached office (est. 1851); national geoscientific survey, mineral block handover for auction, circulars and reports.
gsi.gov.in/home/
- Indian Bureau of Mines department
Subordinate office at Nagpur; mine inspection, mineral conservation and mineral statistics (portal defaults to Hindi).
ibm.gov.in/IBMPortal/
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Ministry's open geoscience data portal for baseline and exploration datasets.
geodataindia.gov.in/
- Annual Reports reports
Ministry annual report archive, 2016-17 through 2025-26, downloadable PDFs.
mines.gov.in/webportal/annualreportflipbook
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Press Information Bureau ministry-wise press release archive (mincode 44).
www.pib.gov.in/newsite/pmreleases.aspx?mincode=44®=3&lang
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Principal Act (No. 67 of 1957) with linked rules, regulations, notifications and orders.
www.indiacode.nic.in/handle/123456789/1421?view_type=browse