558 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
(b) All minerals which are required for war purposes and for which there are reasonable prospects of working in India. These include sulphur, mica, tungsten or wolfram, and non-ferrous metals such as lead, zinc, copper and tin.
(c) The Utilisation Branch will with the help of experts prove deposits and undertake small-scale mining operations which may include the operation of experimental and pilot plants for smelting, etc., up to the stage when it becomes clear that production can be undertaken by Commercial firms. It is the present intention (subject to the necessity of maintaining war production and to the circumstances of each case) that at that stage commercial development should be encouraged.
(d) No, according to present programme.
(e) The Utilisation Branch has already taken steps to examine the possibility of obtaining early production of lead and zinc. The most promising lead-zinc mines in India appear to be the mines at Zawar in Udaipur State. The Government of India, acting through Mr. W. P. Cowen, late General Manager of the Mawchi mines in Burma, negotiated with the Mewar Government. They secured the cancellation on payment of compensation of the lease of the mines held by a private company, and obtained a prospecting licence from the Mewar Government. Mr. Cowen was placed in charge of the operations and began work at the end of May 1942. Operations have been planned in two stages (1) a detailed planetable survey and deep-drilling operations to be followed by (2) opening up of deposits and the erection of a pilot ore-dressing plant and smelters as soon as drilling operations establish the workability of the lode. As a result of the Survey’s progress so far made it is hoped that it will be possible to obtain information regarding the “payability” of the lode earlier than was originally expected. Most of the machinery required by Mr. Cowen in the way of drilling equipment, etc. has now arrived. Two Mining Engineers, one Mechanical Engineer, two Metallurgists and three Surveyors have been appointed to assist Mr. Cowen.
Exploitation of the sulphur deposits in the extinct volcano of Koh-i-Sultan, has been taken over by the Utilisation Branch from the Supply Department and a Superintending Geologist of the Geological Survey of India is in charge of the operations.