Coal India's supply to power sector up 7% in Apr-Dec

State-run Coal India's supply to the power sector increased by 6.8 per cent to 299.10 million tonnes in the first 9 months of the current fiscal.
The supply of the fossil fuel by Coal India (CIL), which accounts for over 80 per cent of the domestic production, in the April-December period last fiscal stood at 280.210 MT, according to official data.
The coal dispatch by the world's largest coal miner last month increased to 37.660 MT against 35.640 million tonnes in the same month of the previous fiscal, the data shows.
The supply by Singareni Collieries Company Ltd (SCCL) in the April-December period of the ongoing fiscal increased to 35.593 MT, against 28.098 MT in the same period last fiscal.

According to industry analysts, the increase in coal dispatch could be attributed to increase in coal output by CIL and SCCL, improvement in the coal evacuation and opening up of the new mines among others.
CIL had produced 373.45 MT of coal in the April-December period of the this fiscal. SCCL's coal output in the first nine months of the current fiscal stood at 43.24 MT, an increase of 22.74 per cent from 35.23 MT a year ago.

The government is eyeing to achieve 1.5 billion tonnes of coal production by 2020. Of this, Coal India is looking at an output target of 1 billion tonnes.

The government had set a production target of 550 million tonnes for the CIL for the current fiscal.
The official further said panel was of the view that "the
bank guarantee per se was one of the parts of the terms and conditions of the allocation letter dated July 20, 2007 of the said block issued in favour of Power Finance Corporation. As such, the examination of the case should be strictly on the terms and conditions of the said allocation letter."
The government had earlier said that it has been decided to place the matter of deduction of bank guarantee submitted by Reliance Power for Kerandari B&C coal block before the Inter-Ministerial Group for making recommendations to the government.

In 2007 the Coal Ministry had allocated Kerandari B&C coal block to JIPL, a subsidiary of Power Finance Corporation (PFC), subject to certain conditions.
Further, Reliance Power acquired JIPL from PFC in 2009 after emerging as the lowest bidder in the International Competitive Bidding process for Tilaiya UMPP. Subsequently, RPL communicated that it had terminated the PPA and relinquished Tiliaya UMPP.
Hence, Reliance Power requested the Coal Ministry for release of bank guarantee submitted by it for Kerandari B&C coal block.