CIL, GAIL, RCF in pact for Rs 10,000-cr revival of Talcher fertilizer unit

Three public sector units- Coal India Limited (CIL), GAIL India Limited and Rashtriya Chemicals and Fertilizers Limited (RCF) will form a consortium to revive the closed unit of Fertilizer Corporation of India at Talcher at a cost of Rs 10,000 crore..

The fertilizer plant at Talcher which has been closed since 2002, will run on the coal gasification route instead of the natural gas route.

“We have decided to revive at least five out of seven fertilizer plants across the country including the Talcher plant in Orissa. About Rs 10,000 crore will be spent on revival of this plant and following revival, the plant will produce three million tonnes of fertilizers per annum”, Union minister of state for chemicals and fertilizers Srikant Jena told Business Standard here.

Since the bringing of natural gas from Kakinada (Andhra Pradesh) to Talcher through pipe line is very difficult, we have decided to revive the plant through the coal gasification route as coal is available in the area, the minister said.

Besides Talcher, the Centre will also revive the other fertilizer plants at Ramkund and Sindri.

After all these fertilizer plants are revived, the country will become self sufficient in production of fertilizers like urea, Jena said.

It may be noted that every year, the country imports about 50-60 lakh tonnes of urea, 40 lakh tones of Muriate of Potash (MOP) and around 60 lakh tones of Di-Ammonium Phosphate (DAP).

The minister, however, ruled out any shortage of supply of fertilizers to the farmers. He alleged that the dealers are creating a situation of artificial shortage through hoarding and said that the state governments should take action against them to ensure availability of fertilizers to the farmers in time,

He further stated that the farmers have not been impacted by the due to the recent increase in fertilizer prices by the government.

The price rise is very nominal compared to the increase of Minimum Support Price (MSP) of the food grains and we do not think the farmers will be affected by it, he said.