5. Has the government been able to meet its coal production targets through captive
coal mining?
The CAG report clearly states that "the production of coal from the coal blocks allocated
for captive mining was expected to play a significant role in meeting the demand for coal in
the country." However, under UPA-2 rule, coal production targets under captive coal mining
fell short by a large margin. As of 2011, out of 86 coal blocks meant to start production, only
28 did. Similarly, the production from these mines was only 34.64 million tonnes, when the
targeted output was 73 million tonnes.4 This is less than half the targeted production.
As is evident from these statistics, the allocation of captive mines did not lead to the
expected increase in production. A reason for this is that private companies have no incentive
to begin production immediately, as they received the coal blocks for free. In addition, the gov-
