Due to mechanical faults, production at the Maddhapara granite mine in Dinajpur has been temporarily halted.
The matter has been confirmed by the mine’s Managing Director (Acting), Engineer DM Zobaid Hossain.
On Tuesday morning, production ceased from the first shift of 7am. However, the authorities have said that engineers have already begun working to resume extraction.
A source from the mine reported that mechanical faults had been occurring since the night before. As a result, production was halted in the morning.
However, engineers have already started working to resume production, and urgency has been placed on restoring operations as soon as possible.
It is known that the country’s only hard rock mine, Maddhapara Granite Mining Company Limited (MGMCL), began commercial production on May 25, 2007. Initially, the mine extracted between 1,500 and 1,800 tons of rock daily, but later this amount dropped to just 500 tons.
From the beginning of production until June 2013, the mine accumulated losses exceeding Tk1,000 crore. In an effort to increase production, in February 2014, a contract worth $171.86 million was signed with the Belarusian contracting company Germania Trest Consortium (GTC) to extract 9.2 million metric tons of rock and manage mine operations and maintenance. Since then, the mine has started generating profits.
As the government saw profitability, the mine authorities signed another six-year contract with GTC in September 2021 for further rock extraction.
