Coal blocks: SC refuses to interfere in auction process

Apex court allows govt to go ahead in accordance with Ordinance.

In a relief for the government, the Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to interfere with the coal blocks’ auction process and allowed it to go ahead in accordance with the Coal Mines Ordinance.

A bench of Justices J Chelameswar and Rohinton F Nariman set aside an order by the Calcutta High Court, which had directed the government to mention it in its auction notice that a dispute relating to Ardhagram coal mine in West Bengal was pending adjudication.

“The interest of justice demands that the impugned order be set aside recording the undertaking of the learned Attorney General mentioned above. We order accordingly. We leave open all questions of law to be agitated by the parties before the High Court,” said the bench, while allowing the Centre’s appeal partially.

The court recorded AG Mukul Rohatgi’s undertaking that the government, as a matter of policy, has decided not to take over or put up for auction any of the end-use plants of the licensee or lease holder whose allocations now stand quashed by the court.

However, in order to ward off any prejudice, the government said it was willing to earmark the portion of the land occupied by the end-user plant falling within the coal block area, and exclude it from the auction process so that their rights of property remain intact. The court order assumes significance since it has refrained from commenting on the government’s vehement submission that neither it was going to pay compensation to a previous licensee and lease holder, nor auction their end-use plants attached to a coal block.

While it could mean a virtual nod to the auction process, this may dampen the spirit of a section of developers, whose coal blocks were cancelled and they have been demanding either a compensation or auction of their plants.

The court was hearing an appeal by the government against an order on a petition filed by Kolkata-based Sova Ispat. Sova had pointed out that the ordinance promulgated by the government had no provision for compensation for end-use plants attached to the blocks and that it sought to take away the end-use plants without providing any compensation.

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Sova contended that the SC judgement had cancelled the allocations due to the illegal process but it never asked the government to come up with a law that leaves a licensee or a lease holder with no remedy in a situation where their blocks were taken over but the abutting end use plants were neither being auctioned nor any compensation was to be paid. Sova claimed it had invested Rs 400 crore for the infrastructure to go with the coal mine.

Spectrum auction deferred; now to be held on March 4

ENS ECONOMIC BUREAU

New Delhi: The government on Tuesday deferred the telecom spectrum auctions by a week to March 4, with the deadline for bidders to submit applications extended to February 16 from February 6 previously.

The changes were uploaded on the department of telecommunications website as first amendment in the notice inviting application for spectrum auctions.

In the auctions, 380.75 MHz of spectrum in 800, 900 and 1800 MHz bands will be put up for sale, with the telecom ministry also mulling the auctioning of 5 MHz 3G spectrum in 17 circles.

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While a reserve price per MHz for 3G spectrum has not been finalised so far, airwaves in 800 MHz band have been priced at Rs 3,646 crore pan-India per MHz, in 900 MHz band at Rs 3980 crore per MHz pan-India excluding Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, and J&K, and 1800 MHz band at Rs 2,191 crore per MHz pan-India (excluding Maharashtra and West Bengal).

The government expects to earn revenues of over Rs 70,000 crore from these auctions.