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South East Central Railways (SECR), the largest freight-loading zonal railway, has been experiencing a slump in coal throughput for some time now not because of a significant drop in the supply of coal but because of the flagging demand for it. As a result, SECR’s daily average loading has dropped to 5,500 wagons (eight-wheelers) from the normal 6,000 as coal accounts for more than 70 per cent of its total freight loading.
True, there has been some disruption in coal supply, the major reason being the monsoon. The heavy rainfall in the past few days has hit hard coal loading in Coal India Ltd’s mines in the Korba area and Ib Valley served by the SECR.
However, what is of much greater concern is the poor demand for coal from State-owned power generating companies in Gujarat and Rajasthan — a situation that has persisted for the past couple of months. No wonder there has been a drop in daily loading to the extent of five to six rakes on an average, each rake consisting of 60 wagons (eight-wheelers). The coal producing companies too are worried about it, it is learnt.
The drop in demand for coal from Gujarat is believed to have been caused due largely to the rise in imports, particularly by private sector mega power plants in the State. The State-owned power generating companies, it is reported, are buying power from these mega plants at a rate that is cheaper than that at which they would themselves have otherwise produced.
For Rajasthan, there is an additional factor. Several State-owned power agencies in the State have got coal mining leases in Madhya Pradesh with the mining contracts given to private firms. Coal from these mines is transported partly by road and partly by rail. The volume transported by rail is so small, about one to 1.5 rakes a day, that it is insufficient to compensate the loss suffered on this score.
Precisely for the same reason, the private coal washeries in Korba and Bilaspur areas too have been suffering from poor capacity utilisation. There are about half-a-dozen such washeries in the area and their total coal throughput has dropped nearly 50 per cent to around seven to eight rakes a day, it is learnt.
>santanu.sanyal@thehindu.co.in
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