Coal ministry may cancel allocation of 97 coal and lignite blocks
08 Sep 2010
The coal ministry is likely to cancel the allocation of 93 coal and four lignite blocks to various companies for failure to make sincere efforts for the development of these blocks for the past several years.
The ministry will issue show-cause notices to various coal companies as to why these blocks should not be de-allocated, an official release said today.
The government has so far allocated a total of 207 coal blocks for development to various companies.
The ministry decided to cancel the allocation after several reminders to these coal companies in the past, the release added.
The decision was taken at a high-level meeting recently held in the ministry.
Out of the 93 coal blocks, 45 belong to the government sector companies while 48 belong to the private sector companies. All the four lignite blocks belong to the private sector companies.
In addition, the ministry has issued advisories to 23 government and private sector companies to complete the process for the development of the blocks allotted to them at the earliest to avoid de-allocation of their blocks.
In view of the increasing demand for coal, the government is fast-tracking coal amine allocation in order to enhance production. The de-allocation drive is part of this process, the release added.