Now that setting up of a medical college by the Mahanadi Coalfields limited (MCl) is on schedule, there was no reason for stopping mining at the country’s largest coalfields at Talcher on Tuesday causing 2.1 lakh tonne coal production and dispatch loss, said the MCl.An MCl Press release said the second largest coal producer has envisaged an ambitious CSR project of setting up a 100-seat medical college with a 500-bed hospital at Talcher at a cost of Rs492 crore.
Continuously pursuing for almost seven years to get a land free of all encumbrances for setting up the proposed medical institution, the MCl finally received the diversion of a forestland from the Union Ministry of Environment & Forests on December 26, 2014. Thereafter, the MCl identified Central PSU National Building Construction Corporation (NBCC) for infrastructure development of a state-of-the-art Mahanadi Institute of Medical Sciences and Research.
However, some locals blaming the delay on the MCl resorted to economic blockade at Talcher despite the company management informing them about the progress on the project at a meeting at Angul on Monday in the presence of the district administration, said the release.As per an MoU signed between the Odisha Government and the MCl, the company has to make all efforts to ensure admission of students for academic session 2016-17. Hence the company feels that such actions by the protesters are premature or for other vested interests, the release said.
The MCl has a target to produce and dispatch 150 million tonnes of coal in current financial year.As per reports from Talcher, protesters of the Talcher Suraksha Mancha held an ‘Economic Blockade’ bringing operations in all mines to a halt. Staff and officers were forced to vacate the offices of the Area General Managers.This is for the third time in the current financial year that mining operations in Talcher Coalfields were shut down due to agitation.