Coal news and updates

The coal ministry, which has formed a search committee for finding a chairman for Coal India (CIL), has finally invited applications from suitable candidates last week. It has invited applications from armed forces along with central public sector companies, government executives, state and private sectors.

 

This comes nearly six months after Public Enterprise Selection Board informed the government that it could not find anyone suitable for the position after interviewing six candidates in June this year.

 

Full time chairman of Coal India, Sutirtha Bhattacharya, retired on August 31 following which Gopal Singh, the chairman of Coal India subsidiary Central Coalfields, was made the temporary CIL Chairman.

 

Although the post is for a total period of five years, the notice inviting application has allowed candidates with three years of residual service to apply. For candidates from Coal India, executives with two years of residual service may apply.

 

A Coal India executive said that it was for the first time that PESB has not been able to finalise a candidate for the post of Coal India chairman following an interview and has left it to the government to take a new course of action.

 

Following an interview of six candidates, four from Coal India group companies and two from other public sector entities, on Friday, the Public Enterprise Selection Board said: “The Board did not find any candidate suitable for the post and recommended that the government may chose an appropriate course of further action for the selection.”

 

Candidates that appeared for the post from Coal India group companies were Gopal Singh, chairman and managing director at Central Coalfields, R R Mishra, CMD at West Coalfields, A K Jha, CMD at Mahanadi Coalfields and S Saran, CMD at Central Mine Planning and Design Institute. Others in the race were K Biswal, Director-Finance at NTPC and T R Rao, Director-Commercial at NMDC.

 

Although, the advertisement for the post of chairman allowed executives from private companies to apply, no one made it to the final list of interviewees.

 

 

Source: Economic Times