In its most recent survey the Indian Bureau of Mines estimated the country’s copper ore reserves to be nearly 370m tonnes, which should yield 4.384m tonnes of metal. Copper ore resources are quoted at over 1bn tonnes, and that, according to the bureau, should lead to over 7m tonnes of metal extracted. While the country’s reserves and resources are sizable, their exploitation has been modest up to now. Annual mining of about 3.3m tonnes of ore and production of less than 32,000 tpy of metal in concentrate reflects poor utilisation of a national resource. Mining of copper ore was thrown open to the private sector under the national mineral policy of 1993, but despite many attempts by domestic and foreign groups to get access to copper deposits since, the government-owned Hindustan Copper Limited (HCL) remains the only one with lease rights to over 280m tonnes of reserves. Balance reserves are...