Rs 5 L cr funds in jeopardy on coal dearth: Power Secy

Asserting that Rs 5 lakh crore investment in coalbased power plants was in jeopardy due to the dry fuel shortage, Power Secretary S C Garg on Tuesday said there is an urgent need to bring in large global players for commercial mining to boost output.

Garg also said Coal India should be made professionally more efficient as importing 20% of the coal requirement of the country is "untenable".

"Many of our coal-based power plants in power sector are today gasping for breath. Some of them are in NCLT, some are producing 15% some 20%, some of them are not producing at all. And as much as something like Rs 5 lakh crore investment is in jeopardy," Garg said.

Terming the current situation "absolutely untenable" when India is not able to exploit annually even one% of its explored coal resources, Garg said there was an urgent need for commercial mining by big global players to augment output.

"Let us get three to five global big players which can produce 100 million tonne of coal (each year)... that would require a very different way of allocating mines. Today, we allocate small mines... If we can get five of these (global players) who can produce 500 million tonne of coal in next two to three years or five years, situation would change," he said.

He took a dig at coal mines allocation system saying that it needs to be simplified and with ease of doing business it has gradually started changing.

"There is something pretty wrong about the way we are managing our coal economy. We must become exporter of coal rather than importer. Why are we in this situation... Over last few years lots of mines have been allotted to the power sector.