De Beers, Alrosa, Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton are amongst the major mining companies, accounting for majority of rough diamond supplies.
Diamond traders here are floating a company to facilitate direct procurement of rough diamonds from the mining countries.
The proposed firm, Surat Diamond Sourcing (SDS), was likely to have a corpus of over Rs1,000 crore, a top body of the traders said today.
"The proposed company is likely to have a corpus of over Rs1,000 crore with contributions coming from nearly 500 members paying Rs1.8 crore, who shall be the founder shareholders and another 1,000 members who will pay Rs54 lakh each," Surat Diamond Association president Rohit Mehta said.
"SDS will soon be incorporated under the Company Act and registered with the Registrar of Companies (ROC). The shareholders will be issued shares of Rs10 each," he said.
The founder-shareholders shall have voting rights, while those paying Rs54 lakh will enjoy all benefits of being a shareholder except voting rights, Mehta said.
"The company shall be directly bidding for procurement of rough diamonds from mining countries such as Canada, Russia and those in Africa, and shall be selling it through a tender system to diamond units here," he said.
"Despite being a hub of diamond polishing and cutting, we have to rely upon Antwerp (Belgium) and Dubai for getting rough. In majority of cases, traders are being cheated by brokers, while there is always a shortage of rough in global markets," chairman of Bluestar Diamond Asit Mehta said.
"Due to all these issues, the unit owners have to pay higher prices, resulting into reduction in profits," Asit Mehta said.
"Fifty per cent of the roughs procured by the company shall be reserved for shareholders," he said.
"The proposed company is likely to be listed on the stock exchanges in next 2-3 years."
The proposal to float the company comes at a time when the diamond industry is facing problems in procurement of roughs.
De Beers, Alrosa, Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton are amongst the major mining companies, accounting for majority of rough diamond supplies.
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