India's troubles as far as power shortages are concerned are well documented. Households as well as industries suffer on account of the same. While one reason for these shortages is lack of power generation capacity, another big reason is that even the existing power plants cannot sometimes work at full capacity due to fuel shortages. This more often than not is due to the shortage of coal. In light of this, what is ironic is that the coal sector in turn is facing its own set of challenges.
The management of Coal India, the largest producer of the commodity in India, has recently said that it will not be able to meet its 11th plan period target for coal production. The reason? What should ideally take 300 days for a forest clearance for a coal project, is actually taking 5 to 6 years. And so, while we may have gotten liberation from colonial rule over 60 odd years back, we wonder how long it will take for us to achieve freedom from this dreadful malady of delays perpetually marring India's growth rates.