MPT 2019 – A Review

Dr. G V Rao
Co-Convener, MPT 2019 &
DGM (MP), R&D Centre, NMDC Limited, Hyderabad

During the Executive Council (EC) meeting of Indian Institute of

Mineral Engineers (IIME) held at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Dhanbad
(Formerly known as Indian School of Mines (ISM) Dhanbad) on 09-10-2018,
the EC of IIME entrusted the work of Organising MPT 2019 to IIME Hyderabad
Chapter. MPT (Mineral Processing Technology) is annual technical program of
IIME. MPT is a series of seminars organised by Indian Institute of Mineral
Engineers every year. MPT 2019 is 18th International conference in the series.
Dr. V M Tiwari President IIME Hyderabad Chapter and Director, NGRI
was elected as Chairman and Shri S K Chaurasiya, Head R&D Centre, NMDC
Limited was elected as Convener of MPT 2019. Chairmen and Convener MPT
2019 in turn elected their team to organise the seminar.

It was decided to organise the XVIII Conference on Mineral Processing

Technology – MPT 2019 during 16-12-2019 to 18-12-2019 at Hotel Marigold,
With theme Mineral Processing Technology for Global Economy (Concepts to
Commercialisation). A logo was reveals the relationship of Education,
Research and Industry as they are interlinked with the other two areas.

Inaugural function of MPT 2019 was started at 10:00AM on 16-12-2019

in the peacock hall of Hotel Marigold. All the dignitaries were invited on to the
dais and presented a book written by Swami Vivekananda along with a rose
bud. Lighting of the lamp was done by the dignitaries and Ganesh Vandana
and Saraswati vandana were recited before starting of the inaugural function.
Chief guest for the Inaugural function was Dr. K N Vyas Secretary, Department
of Atomic Energy and Chairman Atomic Energy Commission and Shri
Baijendra Kumar IAS, Chairman and Managing Director, NMDC Limited.
Welcome address was given by Dr. V M Tiwari, Chairman MPT 2019, President
IIME Hyderabad Chapter & Director, NGRI. Shri S K Chaurasiya, Convener
MPT 2019 and Head R&D Centre, NMDC Limited presented a brief out line of
MPT 2019. Dr. Narendra Kumar Nanda, President, IIME presented about IIME
activities of various chapters and expressed his happiness about the grand
success of MPT 2019 during the Golden jubilee year of IIME. Dr. K N Vyas,
Chief Guest, released MPT 2019 Souvenir and soft copy of Book of Abstracts
and Proceedings of MPT 2019. The Chief guest in his address emphasized on
the team work and gave examples how a team can be led to successful. He
advised that all the engineers, Scientists and Technicians should work in
teams in harmony and achieve the success. He also emphasized the role of
various individuals and teams in the progress of the nation. Dr. N K Nanda,
President IIME presented Life time achievement award to Dr. D M R Sekhar a
lead collaborator, Xanthate Technologies Private Limited, Vizag and IIME
Mineral and Coal Beneficiation award to Prof. N R Mandre, Indian Institute of
Technology (ISM), Dhanbad. Vote of thanks was given by Dr. G V Rao, Co-
Convener, MPT 2019/ Secretary IIME Hyderabad Chapter/ DGM (MP), R&D
Centre, NMDC Limited.

Chief guest Dr. K N Vyas Inaugurated the industrial exhibition stalls and
hi-tea was arranged after inauguration of exhibition.

Plenary session – I (12:00PM to 1:30PM) was chaired by Dr. Narahari

Sastry, Director, North East Institute of Science and Technology CSIR – NEIST).
Shri M.B. Verma, Director, Atomic Minerals Directorate for Exploration and
Research, Hyderabad delivered a Plenary talk on “Exploration of Strategic
Minerals in India”. Dr. Pradip, Vice President, Indian National Academy of
Engineering delivered another plenary lecture on “Challenges facing our
Industry in the coming decade – Mining, Mineral Processing and Metal
Extraction leveraging advances in digital technologies and renewable energy”.
After the Plenary session – I, the conference gave a break for lunch.
 After lunch Technical sessions I, II, III, IV and V were run parallel
(2:30PM to 4:00PM) in different halls. A break of half an hour was given for tea
and networking. Technical sessions VI, VII, VIII, IX and X were run parallel
(4:30PM to 6:00PM) again after break in Hall No.1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 respectively.
On the first day of the conference 10 parallel sessions were organised where 59
technical papers were presented including keynote lectures and Invited talks.

Annual General body Meeting (AGM) of IIME was held after Technical
sessions were completed. Cultural program was organised with Indian
traditional dances after AGM. Banquet dinner was hosted after cultural
program.

The second day (17-12-2019) of the conference started with sponsors

session (9:30AM to 11:00AM) where M/s Insmart systems Hyderabad, M/s
Thyssenkrupp, M/s Incorp and M/s Spectek presented their Corporate
presentations. A break was given after sponsors presentation for networking
and Coffee/ Tea.

Poster session was inaugurated by Shri P K Satpathy Director

(Production), NMDC Limited at 10:30AM.
 Plenary session on second day started after inauguration of poster
session. Plenary session was chaired by Prof. R Venugopal, ISM Dhanbad. Dr.
K Balasubrahmanyam, Director, NFTDC, Hyderabad delivered a talk on
“Interdisciplinary Approach to Separation Technologies” and Dr. V N Vasudeva
CEO of MPXG Private limited, Bangalore, delivered a talk on “Exploration for
Gold: Target Generation to resource assessment”. Lunch break was given after
plenary session on the second day.

After the lunch break technical session was organised from 2:30PM to
4:00PM. Technical sessions XI, XII, XIII, XIV and XV were run parallel. A tea
break/ networking break was given and then technical sessions XVI, XVII,
XVIII, XIX and XX were started at 4:30PM and completed by 6:00PM. On the
second day 56 papers were presented in 10 technical sessions.

Technical sessions were started by 9:30 AM on third day. Nine technical

sessions were held from 9:30 to 1:00PM with half an hour break. 54 oral
presentations were done on the third day

Technical sessions were divided in to Characterisation, Iron ore, Coal,

Critical & Stretagic Metals, Beneficiation, Tailings management, Bulk Materials
& Cement, Base Metals, Extractive Metallurgy, Computational Modelling and
Simulation, Water and Environment , Flotation etc. Institute wise technical
contributions were given in the next page:
Name of the organisation No. of papers contributed
CSIR - IMMT Bhubaneswar 50
CSIR - NML (Jamshedpur+ Madras) 24 (22+2)
Tata Steel Limited 20
IIT (ISM) Dhanbad 20
Aditya Birla 11
CSIR – NEIST 11
NMDC Limited 10
JSW 9
Essar Steel 8
IIT Hyderabad 5
Weir Minerals 4
Retired Persons 4
Tenova Delcor 3
Hindalco 3
VSKU Nandihalli 3
IIT Madras 2
RDCIS SAIL 2
MBE Coal 2
MD Mineral Technologies 2
CMET Hyderabad 2
BARC 2
Vedanta 2
Others 31
Total 230
 Others include JNARDDC, ARCI, Thyssenkrupp, CSIR – CIMFR, CSIRO,
Primetals, NIT Rourkela, NIT Calicut, Monash University, Curtin University,
NTNU, NFC, Andhra University, TCS, BIT Sindhri, SMIORE, HZL, NGRI etc.

Each technical session consists of a Keynote address, Invited talk and

Technical presentations.

This conference included 4 Plenary Talks, 18 Keynote addresses, 21

Invited Talks, 130 oral presentations and 69 Poster presentations.
Technical papers were presented in different sessions like Iron ore (4
sessions), Coal (3), Critical and strategic Metals (4), Beneficiation (2), Tailings
Management (2), Bulk Material & Cement (1), Base Metals (2), Extractive
Metallurgy (2), Computational Modelling and Simulation (1), Water and
environment (2), Flotation (1) and Miscellaneous (1) with a total of 29 sessions.
A total of 29 sessions were held with a time period of more than 2610
minutes (29*90) technical sessions, 4 Plenary sessions (180 minutes) and
Sponsors session of 90 minutes were conducted. A fruitful time of more than
2880 minutes were added to this MPT 2019.

Valedictory function of MPT 2019 was started at 1:00PM on 18-12-2019

in Peacock hall, Hotel Marigold. Chief guest for the Valedictory function was
Prof. B S Murthy, Director, IIT Hyderabad. Prof. Muthry emphasized the
importance of Research & Development, innovations in processing, water and
energy optimisation and role of young generation in nation building. Dr. N K
Nanda presented awards to nominees of

a) Mineral Characterisation (Peravadhanulu Award),

b) Mineral Beneficiation (Khare Award)
c) Electro & Hydrometallurgy, Bio-processing (Mishra Award), and
d) Environment Topics Related to Mineral Processing (Tamotia Award)

Prof. B S Murthy presented best paper awards and best poster award.
Veledictory function completed after presentation of vote of thanks by Dr. G V
Rao, Secretary IIME Hyderabad Chapter and Co-Convener MPT 2019.

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