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SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav has written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, saying the move which got in-principle approval of the Union Cabinet two weeks back would be against public interest.
"It will be completely against public interest to institute an idea (price pooling) and its implementation by the Government....( It will) aid the private sector to secure coal supply at lower than market rates and make windfall gains at the cost of public sector," Yadav said.
Urging the Prime Minister not to proceed on implementation of mechanism in its present form, Yadav demanded restricting the "price pooling to power plants owned by central and state sector."
The letter comes against the backdrop of independent directors on the board of Coal India strongly opposing price pooling of domestic and imported coal as they believe the mechanism would have financial implications on the PSU.
On February 5, Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari had said that the the Cabinet had given in-principle approval for averaging of prices of domestic and imported coal to get a uniform feedstock price in the country.
The SP supremo said the concept was good when it came to meeting shortfall in domestic supply but was "astonishing when it suggested that coal imported by Coal India will be distributed even to private sector plants also at a price lower than the market price."
