India: Ministry of Steel Asks Steel Units to Continue Operations

Steel Ministry today released an official notification asking steel units to continue production. This announcement was made after several state governments imposed restrictions on the operation of non-essential commercial establishments and movement of people, in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19. This resulted in steel plants facing issues like- entry of workers, supply of raw material and despatch of finished steel.

The Ministry in its statement said, "In view of the fact that Section 2(1)(a)(xii) of the Essential Services Maintenance Act, 1981 clearly lists "any service in any establishment or undertaking dealing with production, supply or distribution of coal, power, steel or fertilizers;" as an "Essential Service", it is requested that no restrictions should be imposed on the production of steel plants (both Integrated Steel Plants or Induction Furnace or Electric Arc Furnace based steel units), entry-exit of workers engaged in these plants, movement (both rail and road as well as through waterways/sea) of raw materials (iron ore, coal, limestone, dolomite, ferro-alloys, scrap, sponge iron etc.) and intermediate or finished steel products to or from such plants."

"Considering the fact that mining activities are integral to the operations of steel plants, it is also requested that no restrictions should be placed on the operation of mining of iron ore, coking coal, thermal coal, limestone, dolomite, manganese chromite etc., as well as operation of sponge iron, ferro-alloys, iron ore pellet plants etc. which supply critical raw materials for steel making", the Ministry added.