State-owned Coal India joins hands with Administrative Staff College (ASCI) in Hyderabad to strengthen its land acquisition apparatus, according to sources.

The aim is to train its executives with the changing rules and regulations, create a framework for acquisition and compensation, digitise land details in coal bearing zones and improve liaison with the State governments.

CIL has a sound rehabilitation and resettlement policy (2012). But the scheme now requires to be upgraded to the levels prescribed by the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 and, a plethora of state specific acts.

Huge land requirement India is a poor third in terms of total coal production. According to World Coal Association, the country produced 613 million tonne (mt) of fuel in 2013 as against 904 mt of USA and 3,561 mt of China.

But the country’s land requirement for coal production is relatively higher than its peers due to lack of focus on intensive underground mining. Nearly 93 per cent of Indian coal is produced from opencast sources as against 60 per cent in the US and 14 per cent in China.

For a country that has 10 times higher population-density than the US and 2.5 times of China; it’s a difficult proposition. It has been more difficult because India has three times higher share (of total land mass) of arable land than either the US or China.

A back-of-the-envelope assessment suggests the country now acquires approximately 2,700 hectares of land a year to maintain production. The requirement will increase by 1,000 hectares a year, if the coal production reaches the projected 1.5 billion tonne.

As the pivot of this coal production capacity expansion plan, CIL will be at the forefront of this land acquisition programme. Leaving the social resistance aside (which is the biggest risk factor), CIL is now woefully short of infrastructure to acquire such large quantities of land.

CIL to face heat As a State-owned company, it has the advantage of issuing acquisition notices under the Coal Bearing Areas (acquisition and Development) Act (CBA). However, in the absence of proper land records and minimum digitisation, the acquisition process is mired with disputes.

Apart from training, ASCI will help CIL digitise land records (including crop intensity) in coal bearing areas and create a software based system to help company management create the most efficient framework for land acquisition.

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