Coal shortage | No need to panic, says Prahlad Joshi

The Minister said that some people were speaking as if the whole country would be blacked out after 10 days, which was not the case

Union Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, Coal and Mines Pralhad Joshi has said that there is no need to panic over the issue of coal shortage as there is requisite stock in the nation’s power plants and coal companies.

Speaking to presspersons in Hubballi on Saturday, Mr. Joshi said that there was a stock of 21.55 million tonnes of coal in thermal power plants and 72.05 million tonnes in coal companies. “There is no need to panic,” he said.

The Minister said that some people were speaking as if the whole country would be blacked out after 10 days, which was not the case. The Union Government was supplying 1.07 million tonnes of coal on a regular basis. However, as there was a sudden spurt in demand, the Railway Ministry was taking steps to transport the same, he said.

On the PSI recruitment scam and cancellation of the earlier examination, he said that the Government had decided to re-conduct the examination and sometimes such decisions become inevitable.  Some people had misused technology and taking serious note of the issue the Government had initiated an inquiry and arrested the main accused. Further steps would be taken to check recurrence of such scams, he said.