Odisha signs MoU for SPV to evacuate coal from mines

Odisha Sun Times Bureau
New Delhi, Apr 20:

The Odisha government today inked a tripartite memorandum of understanding (MoU) for floating a first of its kind Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) in the country for evacuation of coal from the pitheads today.

State Transport and Commerce Minister Ramesh Majhi signed the MoU on behalf of the Odisha government at the Rail Bhavan here. The other parties in the MoU are the Union Ministries of Coal and Railways. Both Union Railways Minister Suresh Prabhu and Coal Minister Piyush Goyal were present during the inking of the MoU.

The SPV, formed primarily for evacuation of coal, will ahev provision for project specific SPVs where private partners can have equity participation.

While the state government will have 10 per cent equity in the SPV, the Ministry of Coal will have 64 per cent and the Railways ministry hold 26 per cent.

The SPV will develop rail infrastructure to facilitate transportation of coal from the state’s coal mines.

Doubling of track and in some cases trebling of tracks in the coal mines area of the state will be undertaken through the SPV. In the preliminary phase, doubling of the track on the Sambalpur-Titlagarh section and development of rail track on Sambalpur-Talcher and Titlagarh-Raipur sections will be undertaken. Apart from this there are also plans for development of Talcher coalfields.

Evacuation of coal has assumed significance as Coal India and its subsidiaries plan to increase production.

Stockpiling of coal at pitheads has been a pressing problem for both the Centre and the state government. The SPVs have been planned for evacuating coal.

It may be recalled that Coal secretary Anil Swaroop had announced in February this year formation of two SPVs to facilitate speedy evacuation of coal from Talcher and Ib valley coalfields in the state.