Soon after taking charge as Union Coal Minister, senior BJP leader G Kishan Reddy has been focusing on auctioning of Singareni coal mines in Telangana. The Congress government in the state is also responding to Kishan Reddy’s moves.
However, the main opposition party is suspecting a conspiracy of the BJP and the Congress to `weaken’ the Singareni Collieries Company Limited (SCCR) by depriving it of direct allocation of coal mines.
BRS working president and former minister K T Rama Rao accused that the BJP-led Centre and the Congress-led State government were conspiring to deprive the SCCL of coal mines so that the company would find itself on a weak foot, run into losses and later, be pushed into private hands. He found fault with the State government for opting to participate in the coal mine auctions instead of seeking direct allocation of coal mines to Singareni.
The Centre is auctioning more than 60 mines across the country, including coal blocks pertaining to Singareni, from Friday. The State government’s participation in the auction contradicts their previous stance of opposing the auction and seeking direct allocation from the Centre to Singareni,
Rama Rao said, pointing out several instances where coal mines were allocated without bidding to entities in other States, but not to Singareni. In 2015, he said two mines in Odisha were given to Neyveli Lignite Corporation. Similarly, four coal mines were allocated to public sector companies in Gujarat without bidding.
The BJP’s Tamil Nadu president Annamalai had successfully lobbied to exclude coal mines in his State from auction, he said. But, he lamented that the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant’s plea for the Bailadila coal mine in Chhattisgarh was ignored.
Without a dedicated coal mine, the company was pushed into losses and attempts were made for its privatisation, he added. He cautioned that a similar strategy was being applied to Singareni, aiming to force the company into losses by denying it coal mine allocations, ultimately pushing it towards privatisation in the long run.
KTR recalled that as TPCC chief Chief Minister Revanth Reddy had previously urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi not to auction the Singareni coal mines, but he alleged that now compromising with the centre’s move. He said that former chief minister KCR had resisted auctioning of Telangana’s coal mines for 9.5 years to protect Singareni, but Revanth Reddy seems to have joined hands with the BJP for its permanent closure.
He lamented union minister Kishan Reddy’s eagerness for these auctions and asked whether the denial of direct coal mine allocations was a “return gift” from the BJP to the State which gave it eight MP seats recently.
