The Ministry of Coal has opened bids for the 12th round of commercial coal block auctions, excluding six underground blocks.
Among the participants were key central sector public sector undertakings , including Damodar Valley Corporation, NLC India Limited, and Western Coalfields Limited. The auction process, which included the decryption of online bids and the opening of offline documents in the presence of bidders, is now set to proceed to the evaluation phase. A multi-disciplinary technical evaluation committee will assess the bids and shortlist technically qualified bidders for the upcoming electronic auction to be conducted via the mine surveillance and tracking system portal. In a paralell development, the ministry has awarded the Marwatola–II coal block to Singhal Business Private Limited. This marks the 200th coal mine allocation by the ministry.