The suggestion made by the PMO to set up an Inter-Ministerial Group (IMG) to ensure timely clearances from the ministry of environment & forests for coal blocks, before auctioning takes place, makes eminent sense. Statistics at the end of the last year showed that only one-eighth of the 200-odd coal blocks allotted until March 2009 could be made operational due to various obstacles, including difficulties faced in obtaining statutory environment and forestry clearances from concerned ministries at the Centre and in states. Recent developments suggest a further escalation of delays. This is because the ministry of environment & forests has now submitted to the Prime Minister the preliminary analysis of a digitised mapping project, which superimposes coal bearing areas on forest areas to identify coal rich areas that have the least possibility of damaging the dense forest cover. The idea is to demarcate the coal blocks into A and B categories and to deny all forest clearances in the A-category blocks, defined as those areas with dense forest cover or in important wildlife areas, while fast-tracking clearances in the B-category blocks. This has set alarm bells ringing because most of the coal deposits, which are estimated to be around 267 billion tonnes, are largely in dense forest areas. The country has been facing larger shortages, with the gap between domestic production and demand widening each year. Numbers for 2009-10 show that coal production was only 532 million tonnes as against the projected demand of the 604 million tonnes, primarily due to the rising demand from the power sector. But despite the large reserves, stepping up domestic production has not been easy. The gestation period often extends to seven years when even the government guidelines suggest that coal production should start within 42 months from a captive coal block and within 54 months in open cast mines in forest areas.
But coal is not the only sector hampered by slow environmental and forest clearances. The total number of projects awaiting environmental clearance in March 2010 was 99, of which 37 have been delayed for more than three months. Most of the industries affected are in three sectors, namely steel (37), coal (25) and thermal power (21). Similarly, there are another 67 projects awaiting forest clearances from the state governments, of which the maximum were in coal (14) and roads (8). Faster clearance would require more pro-active and innovative steps by the ministries both at the Centre and in states, and it would be best that the IMG laid down clear guidelines to speed up the process.
