By IANS,
New Delhi : State miner Coal India Ltd (CIL) said Wednesday the company was committed to investing Rs.40,000 crore in the 12th Plan period (2012-17).
“Capital investment plan for the current and next 5 year plan was discussed. We have a plan for our Rs.25,400 crore (investment) for the current five year plan, plus another Rs.14,500 crore if certain conditions are made. So that takes us to Rs.40,000 crore total,” CIL chairman S. Narsingh Rao said after a coal ministry review meeting of the company, chaired by Coal Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal.
According to Rao, capital expenditure over the next Plan period is to be mainly on developing more than 100 underground and opencast mines in seven coal producing subsidiaries.
CIL, which accounts for over 80 per cent of the domestic coal production, also plans to set up 22 new washeries. It is also planning acquisition of assets abroad.
Rao said apart from this, CIL is planning a conditional investment of Rs 14,500 crore on augmenting rail infrastructure.
“We plan to spend Rs.7,500 crore on rail infrastructure provided the Railways complete the project on time. We intend to spend another Rs.7,000 crore on rail projects for faster transportation of coal if all goes well,”
Earlier, the Coal India chairman along with heads of nine other public sector companies in the infrastructure sector met Finance Minister P Chidambaram and committed to stepping up investments.
Rao said CIL was making all attempts to boost production and was hopeful of meeting the production target of 464 million tonnes for the current fiscal.