The Lok Sabha passed the Coal Mines Bill
A file photo shows trucks waiting to be loaded with coal at a mine in Ramgarh. The Lok Sabha on Friday passed a bill providing for a fresh auction of 204 coal blocks that were allotted by the Supreme Court.
Tgovernment on Friday assured the Lok Sabha that Coal India Ltd. will not be denationalized. “We are actually strengthening it,” said Minister of State for Coal Piyush Goyal as he steered the Coal Mines (Special Provisions) Bill, 2014 through the lower house by voice vote.
Although some opposition parties made arguments for submitting the bill to the department’s Standing Committee, their opposition to the proposed legislation faded away by the time the debate ended. The opposition strategy appeared to be to force the bill into a select committee in the Rajya Sabha, where it has the power to do so; to use the Lok Sabha only to express its reservations, particularly on the end-use clause, which “left the door open to discretion”.
With the Opposition questioning the government’s rush to push the law without scrutiny, Mr. Goyal said such “willingness” was necessary because of the Supreme Court’s order canceling the allocation of 204 coal blocks. “The government had to go down the ordinance route to deal with fears of job losses and to ensure electricity supply.” He declined a request to refer the bill to a standing committee, saying it essentially replaces an ordinance that has been widely discussed and “no provision has been criticized in public debate.”
Earlier, Jyotiraditya Scindia (Congress) and Kalyan Banerjee (Trinamool) pointed out that there was no provision in the bill to improve the working conditions of miners. Mr Scindia, a former power minister, said the government had missed a “tremendous opportunity to revamp the coal sector”. He emphasized that the bill needs to meet certain goals – to reduce the coal deficit and make the mining process more scientific and cost effective. He reasoned that there should be a price cap and reverse auctions for regulated entities, while for unregulated entities the idea should be to maximize revenue through auction.
Mr. Bannerjee wanted to know why the provisions of the bill did not include anything on how to strengthen Coal India and its subsidiaries, who were upset with the minister who suggested that political parties should not oppose the bill because states with mines would get money: “The mines are the property of the states… You are not giving any charity… (You) are making money from the property of the state governments….”
Tatagatha Satpathy (BJD) also made a similar remark about “the militancy with which the idea is being pushed that all regional parties and politicians should be silent primarily because the proceeds of the bids will go to the state governments”.
He also described the bill’s definition of “end use” as “suspect” as it spoke of “any other use as specified by central government. This meant, he stressed, that a “wide door” was left open to “discretionary practices”.
Allocation of coal blocks: a chronology of events
July 14, 1992
A number of coal blocks which were not in the production plan of Coal India Ltd and Singareni Collieries Company Limited (SCCL) were identified and a list of 143 blocks was prepared.
1993 to 2010
A total of 70 coal mines or blocks were allocated between 1993 and 2005, 53 in 2006, 52 in 2007, 24 in 2008, 16 in 2009 and one in 2010. A total of 216 blocks were allocated between 1993 and 2010, of which 2 were actually mined in various times. number of allocated blocks 194.
March 2012
Draft CAG report accuses government of “inefficient” allocation of coal blocks during 2004-2009; estimates the windfall allocated at Rs 10.7 crore.
May 29, 2012
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh offers to give up his public life if found guilty of fraud. May 31, 2012: CVC directs CBI probe on complaint of two BJP MPs – Prakash Javadekar and Hansraj Ahir.
June 2012
The Coal Ministry forms an inter-ministerial panel to review the block allocation process and decide on either deallocation or forfeiture of bank guarantees. Since then, the government has taken back about 80 coal fields, with bank guarantees forfeited in 42 cases.
August 2012
The CAG’s final report tabled in Parliament reduces the loss to the exchequer to Rs 1.86 crore.
August 25, 2012
Govt says CAG’s theory of projected losses is wrong, no mining yet.
August 27, 2012
PM says CAG is flawed; “CAG’s observations are clearly questionable”
September 6, 2012
PIL in SC seeks cancellation of 194 coal block allocations. Supreme Court begins monitoring CBI probe into coal field allocations.
March 2013
Supreme Court asks CBI not to share details of investigation with government.
April 23, 2013
The Standing Committee on Coal and Steel, in a report submitted to Parliament, said that the coal blocks distributed between 1993-2008 were done in an unauthorized manner. He says the allotment of mines where production has not started should be cancelled.
April 26, 2013
CBI Director Ranjit Sinha submits an affidavit that the investigation report shared with Law Minister Ashwani Kumar.
May 10, 2013
Ashwani Kumar resigns.
June 11, 2013
CBI registers First Information Report (FIR) against Naveen Jindal and Dasari Narayana Rao.
October 16, 2013
The CBI filed an FIR against industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla and former coal secretary PC Parakha.
July 2014
The Supreme Court sets up a special CBI court to hear all coal field allocation cases.
August 2014
The CBI decides to close its case against Birla and Parakha.
Published – 12 Dec 2014 17:53 IST