Indeed, a golden opportunity

Maybe our fathers and grandfathers had heard and thrived during the times of Kolar Gold Mines. Their history is as ancient as our country. These Kolar Gold Mines (KGM) started mining way back during the first millennium BC with linkages to the Indus Valley civilization. Golden objects found in Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro have been traced coming from KGM.

It was under the British in 1890s that large scale mining started in these mines and they were taken over by the Government of Mysore in 1956 and by the Ministry of Finance, Government of India in 1962. They were handed over to the government company called Bharat Gold Mines under the Ministry of Mines in 1972. The company has the record of having Morarji Desai as its chairman (when it was with the Finance Ministry) and some of the erstwhile chief Ministers of Mysore State (when it was with the government of Mysore).

The mines were closed down in 2001 due to fall in production and increasing costs. In July 2010, the Supreme Court approved the central government's plan to float global tenders to revive the gold mines, 12 years after they were closed down.

The latest news on this front is that on April 11, Australian miner Citigold Corp with its consortium with the Essel group, will be bidding for the mining assets in Kolar. The idea is that with it revival, maybe gold production within India will go up and this could in turn help bring down our import bill. India’s gold import bill currently stands at Rs.2.3 lakh crore or $35 billion.