Two large coal blocks, with a combined annual peak production capacity of 15 million tonnes (MT), were auctioned off to private players on Friday and winning bidders offered handsome revenue share to state governments in order to win the mines. Aditya Birla Group’s Essel Mining grabbed the Radhikapur East block in Odisha by quoting a revenue share of 16.75% and for the Urma Paharitola mine in Jharkhand, Aurobindo Realty made the highest bid of 26.5% revenue share.
The Union government expects the Odisha government to earn Rs 467 crore annually from revenue share, when the Radhikapur East mine reaches its annual peak production capacity of 5 MT. Similarly, Jharkhand is expected to earn Rs 1,416 crore from Urma Paharitola mine’s peak annual production of 10 MT. This is the first time that coal assets are being auctioned off through the new market-determined revenue share model, replacing the erstwhile fixed fee/tonne regime.
