Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Sunday, Sep 15, 2002
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Sunday, Sep 15, 2002 |
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Industry & Economy
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Coal No plan to privatise coal sector, says Minister Our Bureau
KOLKATA, Sept. 14 THE Union Government has no plans, at least for the present, to privatise the coal sector. This was stated by the Union Minister of State for Coal and Mines, Mr Ravi Shankar Prasad. Mr Prasad, while recently inaugurating the Bagdeva underground mine of South Eastern Coalfields Ltd (SECL), said the response from private sector in the area of developing captive coal mines appeared to be poor. A total of 127 virgin coal blocks were identified for development by private investors for captive mining purposes. But only 27 private parties had so far shown interest in such ventures. The progress had been made only in the area of developing three blocks. Stating that India was ranked third in the world in terms of coal production, Mr Prasad said the State-owned Coal India Ltd and its subsidiaries had to prove their competence if they wanted to withstand the pressure of the world market. Incidentally, the subsidiaries of CIL were at present mining in 275 coal blocks and the combined production from these mines was expected to increase from 280 million tonnes to 350 m.t. by 2006-07, in which SECL's contribution would be about 85 m.t. Mr Prasad announced that Central Coalfields Ltd (CCL), one of the three sick companies of CIL, could come out of red at the end of the current fiscal, while efforts were being made to bail Eastern Coalfields Ltd (ECL) out of its financial crisis. The Minister noted that coal-bearing States were enjoying enormous financial benefits out of royalty/cess on coal but it was unfortunate that in spite of receiving prompt and regular payments from royalty and cess and also from the share of Central taxes, not even a fraction of this share was allocated towards development of the coal-belt areas.
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