Unable to iron out inter-ministerial differences, the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs has referred the coal-price pooling mechanism to a group of ministers. Sources said either finance minister P Chidambaram or agriculture minister Sharad Pawar could head the panel. The pooling proposal is intended to optimally distribute the cost of more expensive imported coal among public sector and private power projects commissioned since April 2009 and those likely to come up by March 2015.