Price pooling is still under review: Coal Secretary

Parliamentary standing committee on coal and steel had earlier opposed pass over of imported coal prices to end users

The proposal to pool prices of imported and domestic coal for power plants commissioned after 2009 for deciding the price of fuel is still under review, a senior coal ministry official said.

"We keep on analysing and reviewing the pros and cons of the issue and then we will come to a decision," Union Coal Secretary S K Srivastava today said here. He, however, did not give any time frame on whether a decison on this could be taken.

According to the proposal, Coal India will buy imported coal and blend it with its own stock. The imported coal will be supplied to power plants after pooling its price with domestic coal to address the fuel shortage.

The proposal, pending for couple of years, was earlier shelved during the UPA regime as most state electricity boards opposed it.

The parliamentary standing committee on coal and steel also earlier opposed pass over of imported coal prices to end (power) consumers as it would lead to increase in power tariffs. The proposal has once again been revived to enhance power production in the country.

Meanwhile, speaking on e-auction of coal blocks Srivastav said, the government was optimistic that the model would be successful. E-auction will happen soon. Some work has already been done, and rest assured it would be a successful model which will be very comprehensive," he said.

"Letters have already been issued to the coal block allottees to give the details of the assets and the Ordinance also deals with a delay in providing the details by holders," he said, speaking on the sidelines of an inaguration of a pilot project for computerisation of PF accounts for Kolkata region of Coal Mining Providend Fund Office.