Coal Regulatory Authority Bill likely in Winter session

The bill seeks to set up an independent regulatory authority for the coal sector to address contentious issues like supply and quality

The Bill for setting up a coal regulatory authority is likely to be introduced in Parliament in the upcoming Winter session, a top government official said here today.

"It is moving forward. Most probably it (the Bill) should be introduced in the winter session. All depends on the calender of schedule and priorities of Parliament," Coal Secretary S K Srivastava told reporters here.

The winter session of Parliament will be held between December 5-20.

A decision to this effect was taken at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs, chaired by Defence Minister A K Antony.

The Cabinet in June had approved the draft Bill on setting up a coal regulatory authority.

A Group of Ministers had earlier approved the draft Bill which seeks to set up an independent regulatory authority for the coal sector to address contentious issues like supply and quality.

It will also regulate methods for testing for declaration of grades or quality of coal, specify procedure for automatic coal sampling and adjudicate upon disputes between the parties, monitor closure of mines and approval of mining plans among others.

 Replying to a question on the mood of investors with regard to roadshows by the Department of Disinvestment pertaining to stake sale in Coal India, he said: "Coal India fundamentally is in the eyes of investors. It is a very sound company with strong fundamentals and they (investors) have appreciated various aspects of operations and functioning of Coal India.

"Investors will always have concerns and therefore these types of the interface with investors....There were talks about huge reserves of Coal India. They wanted to know what are the future plans of using these resources," the Secretary said.

The Disinvestment Department had last month embarked on a roadshow spanning across five nations, including Germany and the UK.

When asked about recommendations of the Inter-Ministerial Group (IMG) which reviewed the status of 30 coal blocks in October, he said, "We have not received the recommendations (from the IMG) as yet...Detailing of the minutes takes some time. It will be done very shortly."