Jhajjar power plant, commissioned in 2010, had to stop power

generation a number of times due to non- availability of coal.
State blames environment ministry for
various clearance factors
Even after 6 yrs, Haryana fails to mine coal block
Madhusudan Sahoo
Chandigarh
For almost over six years now, Haryana government has not been able to mine the allotted coal block due to various clearance factors for the project. The state government has blamed the environment ministry for the long wait and the delay of the mining project.

“Haryana was given a coal block in Madhya Pradesh in 2006, but it could not explore it for six years due to delay in getting various clearances including from the environment ministry,” claimed top officials in Haryana government.

The proposed block was primarily allocated to Haryana by the Central government for supply of coal to the Jhajhar power plant in Haryana. The plant, which was commissioned in 2010, had to stop power generation a number of times due to non- availability of coal.

The Centre had assigned the projects to both Haryana and Delhi with an equity contribution of 25 per cent each in the 1,500 MW capacity plant while National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) has an equity share of 50 per cent.

“As the project was meant for supply of coal especially to the Jhajjar power plant in Haryana, we could not go ahead with exploration of the Mara-II Mahan block in Singrauli district of Madhya Pradesh as Environment Ministry had declared the area as ‘no-go’ zone due to dense forest cover,” one of the officials in Environment Ministry of Haryana told Daily Post here.

When asked about any recent development though the block remained unexplored for so long, he said, “It has been a hot issue in the country now. The restriction was lifted only in January this year. So we will have to wait and watch for the project.”

The coal block was allocated jointly to Delhi government and Haryana Power Generation Company Ltd to generate electricity from their coal-fuelled power plants. “We did not go ahead with the mining due to the restrictions put by the ministry. We did not want to invite any trouble in this issue,” the officials said. They said following clearance from the Environment Ministry, the both the governments had asked for clearances from the Madhya Pradesh government which is yet to be issued.

“Even after obtaining clearance from the Environment Ministry, we approached Madhya Pradesh government for issuance of prospecting license, but till date the clearance has not been issued to us,” they said.

Recently, the Union Coal Ministry was under attack in the wake of the uproar over irregularities in allocation of coal blocks following the report by Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG), which estimated undue benefits to the tune of Rs 1.86 lakh crore to private firms on account of allocation of blocks to them without auction. “We have not received any communication even from the inter-ministerial group looking into the issue,” they said.