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Coal India to hire 25,000 workers over the next 5 years

Coal India has decided to add 25,000 workmen over the next five years while three times as many workmen employed by the state run miner are scheduled to retire during this period, a move that is expected to double its productivity per employee and reduce cost of production by about 10 per cent.

The average age of employees will decline from 50 to 45 over the next five years following the net reduction of 50,000 workmen. At present, Coal India has a staff of 3.45 lakh, of which about 40,000 are officers and the rest workmen. The company will recruit 5,000 workmen every year for the next five years while 15,000 will retire.


"These are legacy workmen which CILBSE 2.08 % inherited when coal production was nationalised way back in 1975. The lowest age of workmen inducted into the company during that period was 18 years.By2017, all these employees will have attained at least 42 years of service and will retire," said CIL's R Mohan Das, director-personnel and industrial relations.

The large decline in the number of workmen will result in the share of salary and wages in cost of production to decline from46 per cent at present to 35-40 per cent. Considering a reasonable rate of inflation, the total cost of coal production is also expected to decline by at least 10 per cent and per person productivity per shift is expected to rise from 4.5 tonnes to at least 9 tonnes.

At present, wages and salaries comprise the single-largest component in cost of production of coal at Coal India; it was about 43-44 per cent a few years ago but has bounced back to 46 per cent after the recent wage hike.

"Following the retirement of a large chunk of workmen,CIL will strive for greater mechanisation and increased outsourcing of coal production. This is expected to increase productivity massively," a senior CIL director told ET, requesting anonymity. Officials say Coal India's efficiency in terms of productivity is just about one-third of Australia's.

For example, during 2012-13, Australia produced 425mt of coal with 1.55 lakh employees including outsourced workmen. "But we produced around 452 mt with 3.65 lakh directly employed workmen and some 65,000 outsourced workers. With the reduction in workforce, the gap in productivity is expected to reduce by some notches," he had cited earlier. Coal India inherited a work force of 7 lakh during nationalisation.

Over 38 years, this has declined to 3.45 lakh, CIL chairman Narsing Rao had earlier told ET. "At the time of nationalisation, all and sundry were inducted into the company. They were mostly coal filers and coal cutters with no formal education. In fact, anyone who had his/her name registered with the private miners before nationalisation became CIL employee even without any qualification or age certificate," he had said.