Madhyapara hard-rock mine: 'Low-performing' contractor's tenure extended

The government has extended tenure of 'low-performing' contractor Germania-Trest Consortium (GTC) by one year for management of operation, development, production and maintenance of Madhyapara hard-rock mine.

The GTC resumed operation and production of the country's lone hard-rock mine in Dinajpur after extension of the contract tenure on August 13 with daily output of around 1,300 tonnes.

The original tenure of the consortium of Bangladesh-based Germania Corporation Ltd and Belarus-based JSC TrestShakhtosPetsstroy, expired on February 14, 2020.

The GTC, however, was operating the mine before the countrywide coronavirus lockdown on March 26 following the intervention of an arbitration tribunal to settle pending disputes with the authorities.

"We've inked a side letter agreement with the GTC on July 29 to continue its operation by one more year until February 19, 2021," Madhyapara Granite Mining Company Ltd (MGMCL) managing director ABM Kamruzzaman said on Tuesday.

The coronavirus pandemic period meaning from March 26 to July 29 will be added with the contract period, he told the FE.

Before the expiry of its original contract tenure, officials said, the GTC extracted granite stones to the tune of around 3.75-million tonnes during its six-year deal period since February 14, 2014.

But as per the contract, the GTC had to extract around 9.2 million tonnes of granite during the period.

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