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Informist, Wednesday, Jul. 1, 2026

 

NEW DELHI – India's push to secure critical minerals is increasingly centred on recycling electronic waste, battery waste, and overburdened waste from mines, along with acquiring mineral blocks overseas, Anupam Lahiri, additional director general, NITI Aayog, said at the 15th India Minerals & Metals Forum organised by the Indian Chamber of Commerce here.

 

Lahiri said that due to the growing importance of new technologies within the industrial sector, India is shifting from coal and petroleum to critical minerals. "Not only in India, almost every country is impacted by this transformative change," Lahiri said, pointing to the European Union's framework for identification of the critical minerals. 

 

The recycling of battery wastes, electronic wastes, or mine overburden wastes has picked up momentum in India, Lahiri said. "In India, we are having one technical committee, who is looking after the mines part, and how we can map the critical minerals availability from mine overburden wastes, and other items," Lahiri said. 

 

On urban recycling, Lahiri said that while recyclers have set up their plants, the biggest challenge is the collection of waste from different households and institutions, and moving it to the value chain until the critical minerals are recovered. "At each stage, what can be the revenue stream as well as what are the costs? These two things are to be met. Only then we can have some policy as to what incentive or at which stage the incentive can be given. In that respect, we are having quite sizeable amount of e-waste as well as battery waste. And with the coming days it is expected to grow also," Lahiri said. 

 

Lahiri also noted that India cannot wait till critical minerals are explored in domestic mine blocks. "That is why one of the another pillar is acquisition of blocks abroad and in that regard, the public sector undertakings are doing the work," Lahiri said, adding that a technical committee under NITI Aayog is engaged with projects in Australia, Argentina, and the US. 

 

Lahiri, however, pointed out that while several countries allow acquisition of mines, the ore needs to be processed locally before being shipped to India. "We may have the mines but not the downstream things--that will be a problem," Lahiri said, adding that recycling is likely to be India's fastest route to building a usable and critical mineral supply.  End

 

Reported by Astha Oriel and Sagar Sen

Edited by Himanshi Gupta

 

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