Minerals play an important role in human life. It should, however, be realized that minerals are non-generable resources and hence their conservation should be prime concern of all. It should therefore be ensured that a mineral of better quality should not be used for an industry where a lower-grade material could be used. For example, a chemical-grade or SMS-grade limestone should not be used as road ballast, concrete constituent, or for lime making! Several similar improper utilizations are known.

India in general and Rajasthan in particular have a large variety of mineral resources - both metallic and non-metallic. It has been noted with concern that marketing and use of these minerals is not proper because of lack of awareness of specifications or that these data are not easily accessible. This results in avoidable loss of the resources. Specifications of minerals - precisely stated required parameters of minerals - should therefore be made easily available to increase the awareness and ensure proper utilization of mineral resources.

To achieve standardization, including that for the mineral industry, the Government of India set up the Indian Standards Institution (ISI) in 1947. The scope of ISI was broadened and updated, because of the "…fast changing socio-economic scenario…" through the newly formed Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) Act 1986 (http://www.bis.org.in/). It is well known fact that the mineral commodities occur in a wide variety and are utilized in diverse industries. Thus unlike other specifications, the mineral specifications need not be too strict. Consequently, the industrial units have specified distinguishing characteristics of minerals that they require.

The WEB is easily and ever-accessible powerful tool available at low cost to a large section of society. The mineral specifications in ready-reckoner style presented here are part of the lecture notes collated for the students of our department The data is some what old and is to be updated. Objective of this exercise is essentially for increasing awareness amongst students of earth sciences and mineral entrepreneurs so that proper utilization of these non-generable resources may be achieved. Through these Web Pages the information will reach far and wide and it is hoped that the desired positive effect of mineral conservation will be achieved.. The Industry representatives and knowledgeable individuals are requested to send us, through the FEEDBACK, corrections/modifications/additions for this info, so that the mineral specifications may be updated at regular interval for the benefit of all. The Basic data for these pages were obtained through the good offices of BIS officials Shri N. Mitra, Standardization Director-Metallurgical Engineering, Shri Deepak Jain, Jt. Director & Member Secretary-MTD13 (Ores & Raw Materials Sectional Committee), Mrs. Smitha Unnikrishnan, AGM, Book Supply Bureau, as well as from Shri R. S. Sharma, Retired Additional Director, Department of Mines & Geology, Government of Rajasthan, Udaipur. Miss Mamta Chittora painstakingly word-processed these pages and prepared the.htm format, supervised by Dr. Vivek Mandot. We are grateful to them. BIS has brought out user-friendly and utilitarian CD-ROMs but their cost restricts their widespread use (e.g. the CD covering metallurgy costs Rs.29, 000/- and that for chemical engineering costs Rs.32, 000/-). Besides the BIS Web Site, the following Web Sites could be of interest to the students.

http://www.nic.in/mines; http://www.ibm.nic.in ; http://www.gsi.gov.in ; http://www.usgs.gov http://www.dmg-raj.com; http://www.hzlindia.com ; http://www.rsmm.com ;

P. S. Ranawat, Department of Geology, MLS University, Udaipur;
psranawat@yahoo.com, psranawat@geolmlsu.org