Coal India Ltd (CIL) is looking for convergence of annual action plan (AAP) target and progressive linkage (PL) target as they set two different quantities for the company to supply to its consumers.
While the AAP target is set by the Planning Commission, considering the country?s entire requirement for one year, the PL target is set by the standing committee on coal linkage on a quarterly basis, which always exceeds the target set by the Planning Commission. Standing committee on coal linkage is formed with representatives from the coal, power and steel ministries.
CIL chairman Partha S Bhattacharyya said there is a gap of 28 million tonne between PL target and AAP target at the end of the half-year period of the current fiscal. Coal consumers, as a practice, generally refer to the PL target but ?CIL?s supplies are governed by AAP targets?.
CIL?s AAP target for the current fiscal is 293 mt. For the half-year period, CIL has supplied 138.72 mt, which is 1.72 mt more than the actual AAP target set for the first half of the fiscal.
?Converging the annual action plan and progressive linkage can set a target figure, above the AAP and below the PL,? Bhattacharyya said. CIL officials said as the power and the steel ministry have a stronger representation in the standing committee, they always mount pressure on the coal ministry to increase linkage targets. ?But CIL is not rubber that its production can be stretched,? Bhattacharyya said.
S Mahapatra, chairman and managing director of West Bengal Power Development Corp Ltd (WBPDCL), which is reeling under pressure, said a recent meeting of the standing committee has slashed coal supplies to power plants across the country.
Supplies to WBPDCL have been brought down by 2.5 lakh tonne at 8.61 lakh tonne as against a requirement of 16 lakh tonne. Jawahar Lal Goel, marketing chief general manager of CIL, said although WBPDCL has been complaining of slashing linkage target, power utility has been supplied 6.66 lakh tonne as against 6.31 lakh tonne or 107% of its linkage during the current month. Shortage of coal in the power plants are mostly for low imports and all the power generation companies put together have imported only 40% of their total import targets. NTPC has imported only 17% of its target.
Bhattacharyya said about 14 mt of the country?s total coal requirement was supposed to be imported, of which CIL would import 4 mt. ?We have a choice of either importing 4 mt or producing 6 mt more than our target, but the ministry wants us to do both,? Bhattacharyya said. CIL expects to produce 405 mt in 2008-09 as against 379 mt produced last fiscal. Profit before tax is expected to touch Rs 10,000 crore, excluding the outgo to national coal wage agreement and executive?s salary revision.