CIL officers' strike may impact production by 4 mn tonne

The strike is proposed at the time when the miner is facing a shortfall in excess of 17 mn tonne from its target for 2013-14

The proposed three-day strike by Coal India's executives from March 13 is expected to impact production and dispatches by 4 million tonnes of coal at a time when the miner is facing a shortfall in excess of 17 million tonne from its target for 2013-14.

"The production is peak in March. Each day the production is 1.2 to 1.3 million tonne and with the strike it is likely that it will get badly affected," the president of Coal Mines Officers' Association of India, P P Singh, said here today. "But this strike, which is happening after 25 years when officers had gone for a two-day strike, is to press for performance linked pay and new pension scheme implementation, which requires the Coal Ministry's approval," Singh said.

The average annual impact on Coal India is around Rs 200 crore for not implementing the wage pact of 2007 in totality, he said, adding the total impact on Coal India would be to the tune of Rs 800 crore annually.

The CIL chairman had said a few days ago that there might be production and dispatch shortfall of 10 million tonne from the miner's annual targets of 482 million and 492 million tonne respectively set for the current financial year. Singh said unless they got a concrete outcome from the meetings with the deputy labour commissioner and the CIL management tomorrow, the strike would happen and threatened that they might go for an indefinite strike.The strike may also affect the proposed board meeting on March 13 here, which was expected to clear the policy of PPP model for coal mining.