Mundi: Centre's directive to import coal arbitrary and against public interest, says AIPEF

Mundi (Madhya Pradesh): The All India Power Engineers Federation (AIPEF) has taken strong objection to the directive to import coal by the Central Government on June 01. It called the directive as an attempt by the Central Government to put undue pressure on the states and reiterated that since the state is in the midst of a coal crisis the Central government should bear the additional cost of importing coal.

Federation chairman Shailendra Dubey in his statement issued here on Sunday said that the Central Government order of June 1, says that domestic coal allocation of those states whose powerhouses have not started the process of tender for import of coal till June 3 or have not given indent to Coal India for imported coal will be cut from June 7 to 70 per cent.

Not only this, it is further written in the order that in case of non-import of coal, the domestic coal allocation of such powerhouses will be further reduced to 60 per cent of their allocation from June 15.

Dubey, terming the order as arbitrary, has urged the Chief Ministers of all the states of the country to strongly oppose it in the interest of the public.

It is noteworthy that many states including Uttar Pradesh, Telangana, Chhattisgarh, West Bengal, Jharkhand, Kerala, and Haryana have decided not to import coal.

He said that on the one hand, the Central Government has been claiming till April that the production of Coal in India is larger than the previous year and there is no crisis of coal, on the other hand, on the contrary, the Central Government is saying that Power houses should import coal and now this coal import programme has been extended till 31 March 2023.

He said that most of the thermal power stations in states are not designed for imported coal. Blending imported coal will increase tube leakages in their boilers.

He said that the shortage of rakes of railways is being cited as the main reason. In such a situation, how this coal will be transported to the thermal power stations located several thousand kilometres away from the ports, should also be told by the Union Power Minister.

The Federation has again stated that the present coal crisis has arisen due to an acute lack of coordination between the various ministries of the Central Government - Power, Coal and Railways. Therefore, undue pressure should not be put on the states to import coal and if the states are forced to import coal, then the Central government should bear the additional burden of imported coal.

Supporting the demand of the Federation, Madhya Pradesh Electricity Board Engineers Union opposed the purchase of foreign coal in the country. The Madhya Pradesh Electricity Board Engineers Association expects the Madhya Pradesh government to take decisions in the interest of the consumers without bending to the pressure of the Central government.