In an attempt to ramp up its coal production, city-based mining company, Western Coalfields Ltd (WCL), on Monday, roped in a private player to operate one of its closed mines. The public sector undertaking (PSU) has issued a letter of award (LoA) to Shree Amarnath Mineral Private Limited (in consortium with S R Remedial Services Private Limited and Chandra Coal Private Limited) for the commissioning, rehabilitation, development and operation of the A B incline underground mine. The underground mine is located in Silewara near Khaperkheda which comes under WCL’s Nagpur Area. The mine was closed since nine years. Interestingly, the private players found mining at the same location economically feasible after the public sector undertaking company stopped operations terming it ‘non-feasible’.

 

The WCL’s contract with the private player is for 25 years and the targeted total coal production from the mine is 6.55 million tonnes. Manoj Kumar, Chairman and Managing Director of WCL, handed over the LoA to Shailendra Kailashchandra Agrawal, Narender Singh and Bhupinder Singh Kohali, all representing Shree Amarnath Mineral, at the company’s headquarters in Civil Lines, on Monday. Senior officers of WCL including A K Singh, Director (Technical Project and Planning); Tarun Kumar Shrivastav, General Manager (Corporate Affairs); A P Singh, General Manager (CMC); and Sanjay Bhatt, Chief Manager CMC, were among the prominent persons present on the occasion.