Even as the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Coal and Steel recommended a probe into the “decision-making process” for distribution of coal blocks from 1993 to 2010, Opposition parties today demanded Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s resignation, alleging the Centre was scuttling a fair probe into the issue.
Rocked by the coal scam, both Houses of Parliament were adjourned for the second consecutive day. The question of Prime Minister’s resignation was dismissed by Congress President Sonia Gandhi
The Standing Committee’s recommendation brings more pressure on the Centre, already in trouble over Law Minister Ashwini Kumar’s alleged attempts to influence CBI's status report on the coal block scam investigation, submitted to the Supreme Court.
Slamming the Coal Ministry for distributing coal blocks without any auction, the Committee, headed by Trinamool Congress leader Kalyan Banerjee, said the entire process was unauthorised.
Cancel blocks
The panel, which tabled its report in Parliament on Tuesday, said all coal blocks allotted, at least where coal production has not begun, should be cancelled immediately.
It also recommended that the State and Central public sector undertakings should not allow private parties to extract coal from mines allocated to them. The Committee said that a “most non-transparent” procedure was adopted from 1993 to 2010 for allocation of coal blocks. “The Government cannot give largesse on its arbitrary discretion or its sweet will,” the panel said. It said that the Centre maintained no record of the applicants, other than the screening committee’s minutes on the selection or rejection of applications. Also, the Centre had earned no revenue from the allocation of these blocks. Asked about the quantum of loss to the exchequer because of such actions, Banerjee said the Coal Ministry refused to share such details with the Standing Committee despite repeated queries.
Loss assessment
“We are not an investigating agency and thus not in a position to assess the losses,” Banerjee told reporters after tabling the report. The report said the entire process adopted by the Centre betrayed the confidence of the people.
The report said the captive coal regime, envisaged to enhance power generation, was a non-starter. The Committee said that of the 195 coal blocks allocated so far for captive mining, only 30 have started production. It said of the 160 captive coal blocks allocated between 2004 and 2008, only two have started production. The panel said there was no specific condition in the allocation letter to private players that they should make available cheap power to consumers for using captive coal blocks free of cost.
The Committee pulled up Coal India Limited for its slow pace of work in the coal blocks. It urged the Ministry to ensure that Coal India starts production from the 119 coal blocks allocated to it at the earliest.
It said certain coal mines should be allocated to State Governments for speedy generation of power at a reasonable rate. The Committee said there is an “urgent need” to set up a Coal Regulator to ensure development and regulation of blocks.