Dr Steven Newbery, dismissed former boss of Platinum Mining Corporation of India (PMCI), is seeking to overthrow its present board.

Friday week, June 2, brings a special shareholders' meeting of AIM-quoted PMCI, requisitioned by Newbery, who has moved to remove the company's acting chairman Dr Robert Weinberg, a former City mining guru and director of several mining groups, and his fellow director Patrick Gorman. Newbery, a geologist, was managing director of PMCI, which raised �12 million at 22p through broker W.H.Ireland with an AIM float last year to develop the Boula platinum project in the Indian state of Orissa.

Later, however, PMCI, under then chairman Richard Healey, summarily dismissed Newbery along with board colleague Lisa Pickering for allegedly concealing their ownership of a property which they had leased to the company and not recording it in a declaration of directors' interests. Newbery, who holds some 22 per cent of the shares, and Pickering, with another significant chunk, fought back and Healey and fellow director Alan Kingsley lost their board seats at a delayed annual meeting in February.

But Newbery and his supporters did not regain control and PMCI later appointed Weinberg, a respected figure in the mining scene, as acting chairman and former non-executive director Patrick Gorman as acting chief executive. The Newbery camp now wants to remove Weinberg and Gorman and appoint Vijay Tandon, an experienced figure in the oil and gas business, to the board.

W.H.Ireland as nominated adviser is supporting Weinberg, who warns the removal of two non-executives could jeopardise PMCI's AIM quote and leave outside shareholders stranded. But the company, which lost an interim �179,000 and is seeking senior recruits to analyse a mass of collected Boula data, still has a tempting �11 million cash and the Newbery camp is thought to speak for a sizeable proportion of the shares.

The shares have halved from their float price to 11p, valuing the company at �19 million. Outside shareholders should support the present board.

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