The Union Mines Ministry may call for global tender in another two or three months for finding a new company that will re-start gold mining at Kolar Gold Fields, according to Union Minister of State K.H. Muniyappa who represents the Kolar Lok Sabha constituency.
The Minister said that he met the Union Mines Minister on Thursday and urged him to speed up the revival process, which had begun. Mr. Muniyappa was speaking on the sidelines of a meeting organised by the Indo-Arab Chamber of Commerce here on Friday.
Gold mining in Kolar stopped in March 2001 after the loss-making Union government company, Bharat Gold Mines Ltd., was closed down.
Some of its nearly 3,500 employees rendered jobless went to court for getting the mines re-opened.
On July 9, the Supreme Court cleared a Union government plan to float international tenders, bringing the world-famous and now defunct Kolar Gold Fields back into the reckoning.
Mr. Muniyappa, who holds the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, said that the highest bidder would also clear payments due to the workers.
