| One of the primary reasons for the inadequate and
improper utilisation of Indian clays in the ceramic
industry, despite their fairly wide distribution in India,
has been mainly a lack of appreciation of a good deal of
researches carried out on Indian clays and beneficiations
suggested therein. In view of the fast development of
ceramic industry in the country, the Central Glass and
Ceramic Research Institute took the initiative in collaboration
with Geological Survey of India in presenting
a comprehensive survey of Indian resources of
clay. Improved research tools like X-ray, DTA Infrared
and Electron microscopy have also been employed
by different workers1
- 14 for studying Indian clays. From
these investigations carried out at the Institute and
elsewhere, it could be safely concluded that our country
is fairly rich in clay and there are good china clays in
several parts of the country. Ball clays or plastic clays,
fireclays and bentonites are also available extensively in
different regions. In many of the cases, these depe;sits,
after proper beneficiation, will be as good as some of
the well known foreign clays. It is, however, quite distressing
to note that in spite of the knowledge and information
catered through such Institutions like the
Central Glass & Ceramic Research Institute, proper
beneficiation is seldom done to the clays. As a result,
consumers get a good ground to import clays, draining
a substantial amount of valuable foreign exchange. The
primary object of this paper is to emphasize even to the
point of repeating that if proper beneficiation methods
are adopted, our country can easily satisfy the needs of
the consuming industries and make them completely independent
of imports. We shall discuss here some salient
features of beneficiation with proven merits. |
