The Steel Ministry on Friday said NMDC would review its pricing mechanism. This is the fallout of the CAG report tabled on Thursday that pointed out that the public sector iron ore miner has incurred losses of more than Rs 1,500 crore during 2007-10 for selling ore at less than market price.
"We have given detailed responses to the CAG. Some of them they have accepted and they have highlighted some. By way of corrective measures the board of NMDC, which ultimately is the authority to fix prices, has brought in an international consultant, which is now looking at the pricing issue," said E. K. Bharat Bhushan, Additional Secretary and Financial Advisor, Ministry of Steel.
Their report is expected in January. The board will give due consideration to the report and adopt a formula after talking to all stakeholders, Bharat Bhushan added.
The company is duty bound to give consideration to the points raised by the auditor, he said.
”Policies got changed in line with market conditions. Duties on iron ore were changed. Pricing also kept changing. Output from Karnataka was being sold through e-auctions. In order to streamline all these, we have appointed KPMG to study all these factors. And they will give us a draft report,” said C. S. Verma, Chairman and Managing Director, NMDC.
The report would be ready in a month. Then we would deliberate and decide if any change in policy is required, Verma added.