Railways have already started preparations for adequate stock of coal at thermal power plants to avoid summer 2022 crisis. According to the Ministry of Railways, like February and March, the transportation of coal in April is also 5 percent more than last year. Railways have transported 48.23 million tonnes of coal to thermal power houses in April as the demand for coal is expected to be higher than last year. Besides, Railways has transported roughly 5 lakh tonnes of imported coal to power plants in April this year, which is 18.4 per cent higher than the same period last year. Out of this, the freight traffic of Southern and Western Railway zones has increased by 121 percent and 40 percent respectively. The transportation of thermal and industrial imported coal increased by 15.7 percent in April. Officials said intermittent initial rains in different parts of the country have also affected coal movement, as well as the power demand has not picked up as much as projected earlier. India’s power demand is likely to cross 220 GW by June. The demand for power had increased to 200 GW earlier this year, but thereafter the power demand came down due to unseasonal rains. The power demand remained around 180 to 185 GW in April. Anticipating an increase in demand for coal due to increase in power demand, the Union Ministry of Power had made it mandatory for all power producers to import 6 per cent of their total requirement. Also read: Increasing electricity demand, Railways will run 600 goods trains daily for coal supply States that have invited tenders for imported coal include Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Maharashtra. If we look at the situation of domestic coal, the production of coal had increased to 8,930 lakh tonnes in the last financial year, out of which the government company Coal India produced 7,030 lakh tonnes of coal, which is the highest ever. However, in the month of April, the total coal loading (industrial and electrical) of Railways stood at 62 million tonnes, which is 7 percent higher than the same period of the previous year. The data also shows that the movement of industrial coal has also increased this year, whose domestic supply was reduced last year to give coal to power plants. Sources said that the Railways has set a target of transporting 750 lakh tonnes of coal in May. Also read: Railways will also shut down its remaining printing presses, third party may get contract for printing tickets In May and June 2022, the railways had to cancel over 1,000 passenger trains in the South East Central Railway zone to increase coal transportation as coal shortage at thermal power plants threatened the country with a power crisis. BLiTZ had reported a failure of the government machinery, with the Ministries of Coal, Power and Railways shifting their accountability on the issue. Overall, railways’ freight traffic has increased by just 3 percent to 1,260 lakh tonnes as compared to the previous year. In the FY24 budget, only the traditional increase in freight traffic has been estimated and the emphasis is on repairing the track infrastructure, due to which the movement of goods trains is disrupted. Also read: Coal Ministry targets 1 billion tonne production; Asset monetization can be up to Rs 50 thousand crore Railways need to maintain a growth rate of 10 per cent to achieve 45 per cent share in the country’s freight traffic by 2030 under the National Rail Plan. !function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s) {if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod? n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)}; if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version=’2.0′; n.queue=();t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0; t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)(0); s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window, document,’script’, ‘ fbq(‘init’, ‘550264998751686’); fbq(‘track’, ‘PageView’);