The government is auctioning 42 coal mines among 204 coal blocks.
As India's electricity demand soars, the power ministry on Tuesday reviewed the power supply situation to ensure 'zero load shedding' during the summer months. The ministry has drafted plans ranging from delaying planned maintenance of thermal power stations to mandatory operations of imported coal-based and gas-based stations till September. In a series of meetings with industry stakeholders, Union Minister for Power, New, and Renewable Energy R K Singh emphasised the importance of adequate planning to avoid situations where one state has surplus power while another state faces shortages.
What stood out in his 15-year journey as a member of the political executive at the Centre was his glowing record as India's most successful and effective finance minister. Both as prime minister and finance minister, he understood the importance of gradualism, except when the economy or the polity was in a crisis.
Key infrastructure sectors -- from railways to power, and from coal to petroleum -- will not only be part of the achievements but promises too, as the BJP fights to get a third term at the Centre.
Tata Power, Sesa Sterlite and Hindustan Zinc likely to be hit.
The government on Friday told the Rajya Sabha that seven files, 173 applications and nine other documents pertaining to coal block allocations were not traceable and efforts were on to locate them
The coal-scam has taken an important turn as the Central Bureau of Investigation has charge-sheeted former bureaucrat P C Parakh and industrialist Kumarmangalam Birla. The next big thing is to see that if the coal-blocks allotted, fraudulently, are cancelled or not either by Supreme Court or by the government as pre-emptive action.
Amid rising demand for coal freight and an aggressive push towards diversifying its freight basket, Indian Railways is planning to buy 100,000 more wagons over the next three fiscal years. The procurement plan will majorly comprise BOXN wagons, which are used to transport coal, said a senior Ministry of Railways official. Notably, the railways recently floated a sizeable tender worth Rs 35,000 crore of wagons, which had been in the pipeline since 2018. "Our Budget Estimates for freight increase were conservative.
The Opposition on Monday vociferously raised in the Rajya Sabha the issue of crucial files of the coal ministry going missing, alleging that it was a conspiracy to save Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the multi-crore-coal block allocation scam being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday accused the government of not cooperating with the Central Bureau of Investigation in the coal scam by dilly-dallying on sharing relevant files with the probe agency and demanded that the computers in the Prime Minister's Office, which store such information, should be seized for "data mining".
'The day I took charge, the PM told me you do the following -- stop imports, talk to all stakeholders and involve them to make mining more industry-friendly without affecting the environment.'
A casual worker employed at the Defence Ministry was arrested on Tuesday for allegedly providing forged identity card to a key accused in petroleum ministry leaks case while police maintained that no sensitive documents were leaked or stolen from the defence ministry.
Eleven bidders, including Adani Enterprises, have shown interest in the first-ever coal import tender issued by national miner Coal India (CIL). Recently, state-owned NTPC awarded 6.25 million tonnes (mt) of imported coal tender worth Rs 8,300 crore to Adani Enterprises. CIL, in a public statement on Tuesday, said: "The prominent Indian agencies among them (11 coal importers) were Adani Enterprises, Mohit Minerals, and Chettinad Logistics. "A couple of coal exporting agencies from abroad, including one from Indonesia, have also shown interest," it said.
The Central Bureau of Investigation will question at least two former officials of the Prime Minister's Office who were involved in the processing of the file related to coal block allocation to Hindalco.
The government has fixed an indicative value for Delhi's iconic 'The Ashok' hotel at Rs 7,409 crore under the national monetisation programme, according to sources. The Ashok and the adjacent hotel Samrat are among the eight India Tourism Development Corp assets listed under the National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP) announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman last year. The sources said investor consultation has already been undertaken and a cabinet note for the sale of the sprawling 25-acre property in the heart of the national capital is under consideration.
Indian Railways has managed to improve its freight volumes each year since the pandemic. However, its inability to add new industries and goods will pose a challenge for the national transporter in the wake of it setting an ambitious target of 45 per cent share in the national logistics by 2030. According to officials, the ministry of railways achieved 114 million tonnes (mt) of miscellaneous goods (classified as balance and other goods) in 2023-24.
Coal shortage at thermal power plants is lingering on, with 59 non-pit head projects having the dry fuel stocks for less than four days as on Wednesday, according to official data. The number of such projects having less than four days of coal (supercritical stock) stood at 61 on October 19, the latest data from the Central Electricity Authority (CEA) showed. The count of the plants having supercritical stocks was at 64 on October 13.
In June last year, India unveiled its first list of 29 critical minerals open for private sector exploration and mining. Since then, 38 critical mineral blocks have been auctioned, but only 14 - less than 37 per cent - have found bidders. This modest achievement was secured only after the Centre conducted a second round of auctions when the first round fell flat, failing to attract the minimum required bidders.
Here is the complete list of ministers in Modi 3.0 and their portfolios:
The government has a two-pronged strategy for e-auction of cancelled coal blocks.
Forest and tribal rights activist Alok Shukla will on Friday receive the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize -- 2024 for successfully leading a community campaign that saved 4.45 lakh acres of biodiversity-rich forests from 21 planned coal mines in Chhattisgarh.
An Inter-ministerial panel had last month approved 10 per cent equity sale in Coal India. At present, the government holds 90 per cent stake in the firm.
The Trinamool Congress MP, considered number 2 in the party, also advised Shah to teach nationalism to his son and make sure that the law and order situation improves in Delhi.
Former Jharkhand chief minister Madhu Koda, ex-Coal Secretary H C Gupta, former Jharkhand chief secretary Ashok Kumar Basu and six others were on Tuesday ordered to be put on trial by a special court on charges of corruption, criminal conspiracy and cheating in connection with a coal block allocation scam case.
Buoyed by higher demand for crude oil and imported coal, Indian ports recorded a growth of 11 per cent in traffic during the April-June quarter of 2022-23. This shows that the economy is opening up, a report by DAM Capital said. The volume increase assumes significance since both prices of crude oil and imported coal have been soaring this year. Indian coal companies were pressed for supply amid a thermal coal crisis earlier in the year.
While the SECR has cancelled 22 mail or express trains and 12 passenger trains, the Northern Railways has cancelled four mail or express trains, and as many passenger services.
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Delayed clearances for coal blocks, as well as companies' own failure in developing mines, appear to have had a financial implication of Rs 1.46 lakh crore (Rs 1.46 trillion) for the country.
In 11 out of 29 coal mines successfully e-auctioned, a number of qualified bidders in the e-auction stage were from the same company/parent subsidiary company coalition/joint venture, CAG said.
Non-mineral-rich states will benefit from tariff concessions.
Because of his proximity to Indira Gandhi, he was able to intervene directly at the level of the PMO, which he did in the days leading up to the partition of Pakistan in 1971 when he transferred crucial information about Pakistan's moves via information handed to him by an East Pakistani diplomat in Poland where he was posted.
'At present, hybrids emit lesser carbon despite using fuel than pure play electric cars.' 'That is because EVs have to be charged and 76 per cent of the country's electricity is still coal-based and not renewables.'
The Central Bureau of Investigation on Monday filed its first charge-sheet in a Delhi court in the coal blocks allocation case against Navabharat Power Pvt Ltd for allegedly misrepresenting facts and making "fraudulent" claims to "embellish" its applications to get allotments between 2006 and 2009.
The Coal Ministry on Monday received a total 69 applications from various PSUs
The maiden, critical mineral auction in India has failed to enthuse the mining industry, with the first tranche achieving less than a 50 per cent success rate and the auction of several mines was cancelled owing to low response. The results, announced by the Ministry of Mines on Monday, showed that six lesser-known companies emerged as preferred bidders. Among these were Agrasen Sponge, Kundan Gold Mines, Dalmia Bharat Refractories, Sagar Stone Industries, and Maiki South Mining.
Probe into alleged irregularities in allocation of Talabira-II coal blocks has gained momentum as CBI has started questioning top executives of Aditya Birla Group and were likely to quiz former Coal Secretary P C Parakh next week.
The Central Bureau of Investigation was on Tuesday directed by a special court to record statements of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who was holding charge as Coal Minister in 2005, and others in a coal blocks allocation scam case allegedly involving top industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla.
The Central Bureau of Investigation will register a preliminary enquiry within two days in connection with missing files related to coal block allocations.
The Prime Minister's Office on Tuesday reviewed the coal supply and power generation scenario as the government looks at ways to defuse the energy crisis being faced by several states.
Maiki South Mining Pvt Ltd has bagged the country's first lithium block in Chhattisgarh that was put up for sale, the government said on Monday. Meanwhile, the government cancelled the auction of 14 critical minerals that were on offer in the second round of auction. The Katghora lithium and rare earth elements (REE) block in Chhattisgarh was awarded to the company at an auction premium of 76.05 per cent.
The Indian Railways has decided to not cancel any more passenger trains to accommodate more freight traffic for coal transport. It will also gradually restore the ones it cancelled recently. The national transporter is of the view that coal supply is now reaching normative levels and does not need any more special measures. "Early data suggests that coal supply has stepped up since the passenger trains were cancelled.
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