Supreme Court quashes allocation of 214 coal blocks

The Supreme Court on Wednesday cancelled all but four of the 218 coal block allocations it had declared illegal and arbitrary in its >August 25, 2014 verdict .

Acting on the Central government’s assurance that it is “fully prepared” to face the cancellation of the coal block allocations and will not have any difficulty to take the coal industry forward, a three-judge bench led by Chief Justice of India R.M. Lodha passed the order, opting that the “natural consequence” of its August 25 judgment declaring the allocations would be to cancel them.

On the Centre’s request to save 40 functional coal blocks and six ready-to-function ones, the court said 42 of them would continue to function for the next 6 months, till March 31, 2015, to give the government “breathing space to manage the emerging situation”.