A day after the Union Cabinet approved subsidies for lithium and nickel processing, the Mines Ministry launched its ninth tranche of critical-mineral auctions. It covers 20 blocks in eight states, including three in Telangana and one in Andhra Pradesh, along with 11 blocks offered for exploration licences. Previous rounds show that offering blocks is easier than selling them.
India’s search for the minerals behind batteries, electronics and defence systems moved from processing to exploration this week. On 5 November, Union Coal and Mines Minister G. Kishan Reddy launched the ninth tranche of critical- and strategic-mineral block auctions, together with Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant. The launch came on the first day of the fourth Conference of Mining Ministers in Goa.
According to the ministry’s release and reporting by PSU Watch and IANS, the tranche offers 20 blocks in eight states:
- Chhattisgarh: 5
- Rajasthan, Telangana and West Bengal: 3 each
- Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra: 2 each
- Bihar and Andhra Pradesh: 1 each
The minerals named include graphite, vanadium, gallium, titanium, tungsten and scandium, and the ministry’s release also refers to rare earth elements. The ministry has not published which minerals sit in which state’s blocks; that detail will be in the tender documents.
Alongside it, the ministry opened a third tranche of exploration-licence blocks: 11 blocks across six states.
What the minerals are for
Each of the named minerals has a specific industrial role:
- Graphite: the anode material in almost every lithium-ion battery
- Vanadium: strengthens steel and is used in flow batteries, a form of grid storage
- Gallium: essential for compound semiconductors used in power electronics, LEDs and 5G equipment
- Titanium: used in aerospace alloys and pigments
- Tungsten: used in cutting tools and armour-piercing munitions
- Scandium: used in aluminium alloys for aircraft and in some fuel cells
China dominates the supply of several of them. In recent years it has restricted exports of gallium, graphite and some rare earths, which has exposed the vulnerability of countries that depend on imports. India’s 2023 list of 30 critical minerals, and the National Critical Mineral Mission launched in 2025, are responses to that risk.
How the auctions work
Critical-mineral blocks are sold through a two-stage ascending online auction. Technically qualified bidders compete on the share of mineral value they will pay the state, and the highest share wins. Exploration-licence blocks work in reverse: bidders compete for the right to explore and the lowest revenue share wins, reflecting the higher risk of looking for minerals that may not be there. Bids are submitted through the government’s MSTC portal. Tender documents can be bought until 1 January 2027, and bids close on 7 January.
A gap between offering and selling
Earlier tranches show the difficulty. According to the ministry, 100 unique blocks have been offered over eight rounds, but only 64 have been auctioned. The two earlier exploration-licence tranches produced 11 auctioned blocks.
Many blocks fail to attract enough bidders because they have been explored only at a preliminary level. Investors are reluctant to pay for blocks whose deposits are uncertain. To address this, the government notified the Mineral (Auction) Third Amendment Rules on 16 October 2026. The amendment lowers the minimum number of technically qualified bidders from three to two for a class of minerals, so that fewer auctions are annulled.
More than auctions
Reddy used the conference to present a wider agenda:
- Exchanges: he said a coal and mineral exchange was “about 90% ready” and that “a common exchange platform would facilitate transactions and improve market access”.
- Coal gasification: he said incentives of about ₹8,500 crore had been awarded in the first round of surface coal gasification and four underground coal gasification blocks auctioned.
- Data portals: the Indian Bureau of Mines launched two portals, ANVESH, which publishes data on mineral production, sales, prices and trade, and EKAM, about which no details were given.
- Mineral parks: Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha and Gujarat are developing critical-mineral parks.
The link to processing
The auction follows the Cabinet’s approval on 4 November of a ₹2,814 crore scheme to subsidise two lithium and two nickel processing plants, reported in NSH’s 5 November edition. Mining and processing are separate stages of the supply chain, and India needs both. Without mines, processing plants would depend on imported ore. Without processing, Indian ore would still have to be shipped abroad to be refined. The auctions also matter for the government’s push for battery storage: the 92 GWh scheme approved this week requires batteries with at least 40% domestic content.
What it means for Telangana and Andhra Pradesh
Telangana’s three blocks are among the larger state shares in this tranche. The state’s geology, part of the ancient Dharwar craton with the Godavari valley’s sedimentary basins, has known occurrences of several strategic minerals, and Hyderabad hosts the national institutions that explore and map them. They include the Atomic Minerals Directorate for Exploration and Research, the Geological Survey of India’s southern region, and CSIR-NGRI. Andhra Pradesh, with one block, is also developing a critical-mineral park. Whether the blocks attract bidders will depend on the quality of the exploration data in the tender documents.
