Coal Bearing Act (CBA), 1957 currently allows special relaxations for land acquisition to state-owned companies such as CIL and its subsidiaries only, whereas amendment will allow land acquisition for commercial coal mining by private sector players also.
New Delhi, August 27: M Nagaraju, Joint Secretary and nominated authority, Ministry of Coal, said the government is planning to amend the Coal Bearing Act (CBA), 1957 to allow land acquisition for commercial coal mining by private sector players. The CBA currently allows special relaxations for land acquisition only to state-owned companies such as CIL and its subsidiaries.
“The proposal is currently in the consultation stage in the ministry, but if the Parliament approves it, such land can be acquired under CBA and leased out to the private sector”, he said
Anil Kumar Jain, Secretary, Coal Ministry, said, “I do appreciate that to get a coal mine operational, the allocatee have to get permission from various agencies, which is time consuming”. The officials were speaking at a webinar for the stakeholders of commercial coal mining auctions. The government on June 18 had launched the maiden auction for coal blocks without any end-use restrictions, along with technical bids scheduled to be submitted by September 29.
At the event organized by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Prabodh Parikh, deputy managing director of SBI spoke about the potential concerns of the lenders about the auctions. He said that clarity is needed with respect to land acquisition as some offered blocks fall in areas which had been earlier designated as ‘no-go zones’, and pointed out that rehabilitation and resettlement is the responsibility of the coal mine developer, which can be problematic as a lot of areas fall in eco-sensitive forests and tribal lands.
Most of the mines earmarked for commercial auctions are located in Madhya Pradesh, which has 11, followed by 9 each in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Odisha and 2 in Maharashtra. Maharashtra had raised objections about the Centre not putting up the Bander mine for commercial coal auctions. Also, it is considering replacing four mines with 20 MT per annum capacity in Chhattisgarh at the state government’s request. Lenders are also concerned about the feasibility of coal projects as rising renewable energy is seen to impact demand and put additional pressure on coal prices in the future.
