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Talcher coalfields of Coal India Ltd in Odisha remained closed for the second day on Thursday. A reconciliatory meeting is currently on at Angul between the district administration, the Chairman of CIL’s mining arm, Mahanadi Coalfields (MCL), and agitating villagers.
The villagers brought the operations of the entire coalfield to a grinding halt on Wednesday in protest against CIL’s decision to withdraw job offers to villagers of Bhalugadia in the de-allocated Gopal Prasad West coal block.
The protestors had already enforced a shutdown in the 12-mt Hingula mine for the last three weeks.
Gopal Prasad West captive was created by bifurcating the Gopal Prasad block of CIL in 2005. MCL was offered a 60 per cent controlling stake in the captive block in joint venture with other private sector companies.
Accordingly, CIL acquired land against job offers for both the Gopal Prasad West (captive) and Eastern part of Gopal Prasad held by the State-owned miner.
Villagers of Bhalugadia having contiguous land assets on both the blocks were prime beneficiaries. Following de-allocation of the captive block by the Supreme Court in 2014, CIL withdrew job offers against land acquired for the captive block, trigerring widespread protests.
While the Centre is yet to consider CIL’s plea for return of the captive Gopal Prasad West block to the company, the production loss till Wednesday is estimated at over 4 lakh tonnes.
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