Opening of coal sector for commercial mining on the anvil

NEW DELHI: The Government hopes a consensus will soon evolve on opening of coal sector for commercial mining, a bill for which has been pending for past seven years, Coal Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal said today.

The bill will come up for consideration of the House after "consensus is built," he said during Question Hour in Rajya Sabha.

On how long the exercise of building consensus would take, he said it was the responsibility of both the ruling party and the opposition.

Ravi Shankar Prasad (BJP) the bill was cleared by the Standing Committee seven years ago and was since pending.

The bill is to amend the existing Act governing coal mining, which allows only PSUs to undertake mining besides permitting private firms to extract coal for captive use. The bill has been pending in Parliament for want of political consensus amid opposition by trade unions.

Jaiswal said coal production has not increased on expected line, causing energy shortages.

Land acquisition and law and order problems in coal bearing areas are major reasons for the shortfall, he said adding the government is encouraging coal-users like power plants to looking at opportunities to import coal to meet the deficit.

According to government estimates, India, with a demand for 696 million tons of coal faces a deficit of 142 million tons.