The inter-ministerial panel on coal on Wednesday discussed various issues, including linkages and price pooling. It is likely to meet again next week.
“The inter-ministerial committee, which met today, discussed various issues like coal linkages and price pooling mechanism,” a government official said.
The official further said the committee may meet again on March 14 to further deliberate on the issues as no decision was taken at the meeting today.
The committee formed to look into the fuel issues of power plants, which are stranded due to unavailability of coal, met for the first time today after it is formed.
“That (inter-ministerial group) has been constituted....
We are going to take up those issues as to how to address those power plants which are stranded for the want of coal,” Coal Secretary S.K. Srivastava had said yesterday.
“It is an inter-ministerial committee. The CCEA (Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs) has taken a decision that the IMG (Inter-Ministerial Group) should look into it and see what can be done. But we have to examine it from all perspectives,” he had added.
However, Srivastava had declined to identify the companies which are stranded for want of coal.
Following a direction from the CCEA, the Coal Ministry had set up an inter-ministerial panel to look into coal linkages of power plants — having an aggregate capacity of 16,000 MW — which are at advanced stages of commissioning.
The inter-ministerial committee under the chairmanship of Srivastava formed recently has members from ministries including Power, Steel, Railways and Law.