A day after the government said it would bring in an Ordinance on the cancelled coal blocks, the central trade unions today slammed the proposal to reallocate most of the blocks back to private firms through e-auction even as they stressed that they were opposed to any move to denationalise the coal industry.
Saying they had "noted" the government's decision to promulgate the ordinance to take back the blocks following the Supreme Court order quashing the allocations, the Central Trade Unions, however, said that "the move to again reallocate most of these coal blocks to private entities through first round e-auction is not at all a welcome decision".
The 214 coal blocks in question had been previously allotted to various private firms for so-called captive use.
The trade unions further said that "also unwelcome is the reported enabling provision in the proposed Ordinance for commercial mining by private entities in the future, may be through subsequent rounds, as reported by the media.
"Such enabling provision, if any, will open the door for the de-nationalisation of the coal sector. CITU condemns the move by the government to nullify the Coal Nationalisation Act," said AK Padmanabhan, president of Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU).
The Ordinance has been finalised and will be notified after the approval of the Union Cabinet, official sources had said yesterday.
The trade unions said that the workers' unions in the coal sector, while welcoming the Supreme Court decision to cancel the "scandalous" coal block allocations, have already demanded that the deallocated blocks be vested with or returned to Coal India Ltd.
They have asked the government to refrain from any move to tamper with the basic content and spirit of the Coal Nationalisation Act, 1973.
"Return of all those coal blocks... To Coal India Ltd must be the only response by the government in the post-Supreme Court-order-situation, which is consistent with the mandate of the Coal Nationalisation Act," Padmanbhan said.
CITU said that it has called upon workers and the trade union movement to unitedly resist any "disastrous" move to allow commercial mining by private entities.
