Tuesday, May 24,
Auction through competitive bidding will take place in the near future as a selection process for the allocation of coal blocks for captive mining for specified or notified end users.*
Coal blocks that has to be introduced in auction is still unknown. On the other hand, Government is prepared with 50-75 blocks for this upcoming auction. Previously auctions were postponed due to controversy in categorizing of coal blocks as ‘Go’ and ‘No-Go’ areas.
However, the issue could be resolved at the proposed review meeting convened by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on coal production, which is lined up for June 7.
The proposal for auctioning coal blocks through competitive bidding was settled for the first time over two years ago. Parliament had also approved amending the MMDR Act to facilitate this process.
Meanwhile, asked about the status of 14 coal blocks that were taken back from mining companies over their failure to stick to development timelines, Jaiswal said, he will try to allocate these blocks to CIL and some preference could be given to state governments.
Leave a Reply