Jaiswal cracks whip on Coal India brass

Coal minister S. Jaiswal slammed top brass for ignoring Coal Indias dismal performance.

With acute coal shortage wreaking havoc on power production,coal minister Sriprakash Jaiswal upbraided his ministrys top brass for ignoring Coal India Limiteds CIL dismal performance on the production front.

With state-run power giant NTPCs production dropping sharply by 5,000 MW owing to paucity of the fuel,Jaiswal has shot off a letter to the ministrys secretary Alok Perti earlier this week saying maharatna CILs poor performance in respect of coal production and dispatch is a matter of grave concern for the government which has been further compounded due to growing dependence on imported coal. I am disappointed to note that in spite of my repeated directions and review meeting,performance of CIL and its subsidiaries continue to be far from satisfactory, he told Perti.

Jaiswal cited that both production and despatch records in August was way below their targets. As against the target of 32.03 MT production,coal companies produced only 25.01 MT,while despatch was 30.40 MT as against targeted 35 MT. This happened despite CIL declaring 2011 as the Year of Offtake,he reminded.

With a view to improving the situation the minister directed that CIL Chairman N C Jha should personally monitor the production and daily dispatches and no excuses would be brooked in this connection. He said top ministry officials should make immediate field visits to the coal companies and asses the situation there and chalk out viable programmes to redeem the situation in the remaining months of this fiscal. They must assess the ground level hurdles and the operational constraints and iron out the bottlenecks,he said.

CMDs of coal companies should be made responsible for achieving the targets and non-achievement should be reflected in their Annual Performance Appraisal Reports. CMDs should spend more time in their respective headquarters and coalfields areas, Jaiswal said. He asked Perti to monitor the production programme to ensure that coal firms meet targets. He said performance of Chief General Managers of mines should be monitored and strict action be taken against non-performers.

Company INFO More on Coal India

Stocks More on Coal India