GOVERNMENT POLICY RE MINERAL RESOURCES OF INDIA 239
increase in the superior gazetted staff of the Geological Survey. Unfortunately there was much difficulty in getting a trained personnel that it took practically nine years to fill the required number. The pity of the matter was that as soon as this number was filled, the Legislature in 1931 carried a motion for economy and almost all these men who were recruited had to be axed. I point that out in order to show that if the Geological Survey Department did not play its part in the mineral policy of the Government of India, the legislature to some extent is responsible for that result.
In the limited time that I have, I do not wish to dwell more on the past. I wish to speak about the future. I am glad to say that the Government of India has now accepted the need for a definite mineral policy. That is largely due to the fact that the Government of India has taken a decision to have a drive in favour of bringing about the industrialisation of the country. The mineral policy of the Government of India has been set out in section 14 of the second report on Reconstruction and Planning. I have no time to read section 14 or even to give the gist of that paragraph. I have no doubt that the Members of the Legislature who are interested in the matter will look up section 14 and see for themselves what exactly that policy is.
To summarise the matter briefly, the mineral policy of the Government of India and the action which the Government of India propose to take in furtherance of that policy falls into two parts : in the first place, we propose to reconstitute the Geological Survey of India in order to make it a more potent instrument for the furtherance of our policy. Accordingly, a detailed scheme of expansion of the survey has been drawn up and administratively approved. The new branches of the Geological Survey which we propose to set up will deal with engineering geology, industrial utilisation of minerals, central mineral development, geophysical work, oil development. It will include the establishment of a natural history museum, and a publicity section in order to keep the public informed of what is being done.
The second part of our mineral policy consists of legislation, which the Government of India propose to initiate for the purpose of establishing control over minerals. In defining the limits of legislative control over the minerals, we propose to take into consideration the