Strike hits Coal India; production down to 50%

Company said that Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd in Odisha has been severely hit due to the strike

Majority of about 4 lakh coal workers across the country today joined the strike called by trade unions, hitting 50 per cent of the about 1.7 million tonne (MT) day's production.

Coal workers across the country have joined the nationwide strike on the call of major trade unions like INTUC, AITUC and CITU to pitch for their agenda that includes opposition to any further stake sale in Coal India.

Coal India Director Personnel, R Mohan Das told PTI, "About 50 per cent of the production has been hit as in most of the mines there is attendance by 50 per cent workers."

However, INTUC backed Indian National Mineworkers' Federation Secretary General S Q Zama said, "About 85 to 90 per cent coal workers across the country are on strike and production has been severely impacted in almost all the mines barring those Eastern Coalfields Ltd in West Bengal where the state government has resisted the strike."

He claimed 90 per cent of the day's production has been hit in Coal India mines with work severely hit at its arms- Western Coalfields Ltd (WCL) in Maharashtra, Central Coalfields Ltd (CCL) and Bharat Coking Coal Ltd (BCCL) in Jharkhand.

Coal India, which accounts for about 80 per cent of the domestic production records an output of about 1.6 to 1.7 million tonnes of coal daily.

The Coal India official said that Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd in Odisha has been severely hit due to the strike.

Another trade union leader said that despite the strike being opposed by a section of trade unions including the BMS, it is successful as the the industrial action is in protest against "disinvestment and restructuring of state-run Coal India".

The workers joined strike at a time when the government is putting pressure on the PSU to augment production and has set an ambitious one billion tonnes coal production target for Coal India by 2020.

CIL's achieved an output of 192.37 MT in the first five months of the current fiscal, missing its target of 196.73 million tonnes. Coal India's output target for the current fiscal is 550 million tonnes.

Coal India missed the production target for the financial year 2014-15 by 3 per cent recording an output of 494.23 million tonnes.