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Within days of the Prime Minister calling for speeding up infrastructure projects, 11 power plants worth Rs 52,000 crore have been cleared.
These projects, cleared by the Prime Minister’s Project Monitoring Group, were stalled for want of coal.
The fuel-supply agreements (FSAs) for the projects, including those promoted by Adani, GMR, Lanco and Haldia, will be signed by August 31, a senior Government official said.
The Project Monitoring Group (PMG), set up in the Cabinet Secretariat, is tasked with removing the bottlenecks for stalled projects, with an estimated bank funding of Rs 7-lakh crore.
Cleared projects
“So far two meetings of the Sub-Groups, one with the Ministry of Environment and the other with the Ministry of Coal, have been held.
“We took up 15 stalled projects referred to us by the Power Ministry and managed to clear 11,” said Anil Swarup, Additional Secretary and Head, PMG.
The PMG has set up nine Sub-Groups with the Ministries of Environment, Coal, Railways, Defence, Home Affairs, Petroleum and Natural Gas, Mines and Heavy Industries to look at problem areas.
The cleared projects — Maruti Clean Coal and Power, TRN Energy, Korba West Power, DB Power, Jhabua Power, Adani Power Maharashtra, GMR Kamalanga Energy, Lanco Babandh Power, Talwandi Power, Haldia Energy and Prayagraj Power Generation Co. — have a total generating capacity of 10,390 MW and involve an investment of Rs 52,349 crore.
Most of these projects had problems relating to availability of coal, while some faced environmental clearance issues.
The four projects that were not cleared include one by Neyveli Lignite Corporation, which faces forest clearance issues.
“We have identified the problems in each of the projects and hope to sort these out soon,” Swarup said.
The PMG has created a Web-based information system for use by private entrepreneurs to provide details of stuck projects and point out the problem areas.
The information then moves through the ministry concerned to the PMG and is to be sorted out by all ministries involved.
So far 83 projects have been registered with the PMG and 21 Ministries and Departments have appointed nodal officials (of Joint Secretary rank) to be part of the process.
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