Court cases hit coal e-auction, govt drops 5 blocks

Technical committee to look into end-use of mines

With the former owners of cancelled coal mines filing cases in different high courts, the coal ministry has made last-minute changes in the e-auction of blocks.

In response to a court order in the petition filed by Jindal Steel & Power in the Delhi High Court and BLA Power in the Jabalpur High Court, the coal ministry has kept five coal blocks – Gare Palma IV/6; Utkal-B1; Utkal-B2; Gotitoria East; and Gotitoria West out of the auction.  According to coal ministry officials, 10 cases pertaining to coal mines are pending in various courts.

The ministry has added nine more  blocks from the Schedule-I (unexplored category) to the list of re-allocation. These, however, would be allotted to the states and public sector utilities (PSUs) and not be a part of the open e-auction starting on Saturday.

“There has been quite a lot of demand for allotment by state-owned entities. So the government has decided to add another nine blocks to this allotment category,” said Anil Swarup, secretary, ministry of coal.

The number of mines put for re-allocation for allotment and e-auction now stand at 110, with a cumulative mineable capacity of 350 million tonnes. In the interim, the coal secretary said the government-appointed technical committee, headed by director (technical), would review end-use of the blocks under auction.

According to Swarup, there won’t be any delay in the re-allocation. “The exercise will be completed well before March 31. Within the pre-decided timeline, there could be some changes in timelines.”

The ministry is likely to ask states and PSUs to take a re-look at their applications and re-apply as the number of mines has increased.  The government would appoint custodians for the mines that dropped out of the auction and the ones for which there are no takers. “So in such mines where we are unable to complete auction process by March 31, we shall have this custodian,” said Swarup.

He said the agency which would be the custodian was under discussion.