Mining operations in the country’s largest Talcher Coalfields were closed on Wednesday as locals force-closed all projects and areas offices of the Mahanadi Coalfields limited (MCl). The Talcher Coalfields produces about 2.4 lakh tonnes coal in a day, for on which the MCl pays about Rs3.7 crore as royalty, SST/VAT and Entry Tax to the State and Rs3.86 crore as Excise Duty, CST, Stowing Excise Duty and Clean Energy cess to the Centre.
According to reports, locals reached the MCl mines early in the morning and brought all the mines to a halt while demanding employments for land in the company. They also locked offices of the Area General Managers. But no untoward incident was reported. Villagers of Bhalugadia resorted to the strike in the de-allocated Gopalprasad West coal block, a periphery of MCl’s Hingula Area, that was allocated to the MJSJ ltd.
Villagers of Bhalugadia had been blocking operations at the 12-mt Hingula project since April 15. At least 128 hectares out of a total of 290 hectares of the Bhalugadia village in the Gopalprasad West coal block, originally acquired by the company, had been allocated along with Utkal-A block to the MJSJ ltd, a joint venture of the MCl, Jindal Power, Jindal Steel and Shyam DRI formed in the year 2005.
This was subsequently de-allocated after a Supreme Court verdict last year. While the Utkal-A block featured in the list of de-allocated blocks, status of 128 hectares lies still unclear. Though 56 jobs have been offered to families of the village, yet villagers stopped operations at the Hingula area demanding employment to remaining 62 families of the village whose land was reallocated to the MJSJ ltd.
The MCl, therefore, is not in a position to offer jobs to the villagers of Bhalugadia whose land falls under the de allocated coal block. MCl faces maximum hindrances in operations of the Talcher Coalfields, which had produced 71 mt coal last year. The company had posted an increase of 11 per cent production in 2014-15 over the production of the preceding year, by producing 121 mt of coals. The company has targeted to produce 150 mt coals during the current financial year.
Closure of Talcher mines have a direct impact on common life in the country, as it would result into 2.4 lakh tonnes daily output loss of coal, which feeds power stations, including NTPC Kaniha, TTPS Talcher, Nalco, Jindal Steel & Power, Angul, GMR Kamlanga Energy ltd, Sterlite Energy ltd and many other plants in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Gujarat, West Bengal, Maharashtra and Punjab.