Kolkata: Coal Minister Piyush Goyal made a fervent appeal to the employees of state-owned Coal India Ltd (CIL) to work towards meeting the two crucial production targets of 2018 and 2020.
CIL has set a production target of 600 MT by 2018 and one billion tonnes by 2020.
"This target is not unachievable. Please take this as a challenge and turn this into a possibility," Goyal said at the 43rd foundation day celebration of CIL here last evening.
Goyal, who is also the railway minister, said the goal would be to make the country self-sufficient in permanent availability of quality coal and at cheap rates.
Exhorting the employees to come forward, he said it was the duty of each one of the CIL family to contribute to the fullest extent. There was no room for complacency, the said.
For the current fiscal, the production target of 600 MT was reached by adding an incremental 46 MT to the last financial year's figure. Goyal also laid the foundation stone of Indian Institute of Earth Sciences under the aegis of Ranchi-based Indian Institute of Coal Management.
Coal secretary Sushil Kumar said CIL was sitting on a cash surplus of Rs 30,000 crore in its balance sheet. "What we need at the moment is increased productivity by the employees," he said.
CIL Chairman Gopal Singh said, "It is possible that we will not only meet, but also surpass the targets".
Commenting on the recently concluded wage agreement, Singh said, "This is a historical wage agreement. To make things easier for meeting the liability."
CIL has decided to contribute seven per cent to the pension fund, which will be matched by an equal contribution by the employees, he said.
Singh said there had been fears that the pension of retired employees were going to stop in the next two to three years post implementation of the accord.
In September, CIL had given 31 per cent more coal to the power plants, a trend which was maintained in the subsequent month, he said.
