The government said on uesday that it will begin allocating 17 coal blocks to public sector firms by the end of next month.

When asked about allotting mines to government firms, Coal Secretary S. K. Srivastava said, “It should be by middle of April or end of April.”

The government had put on offer 14 coal blocks last year, for power sector and three for mining firms.

He also said that the government was addressing a few issues with regard to coal blocks auction and the government was willing to allot mines through through competitive bidding route as soon as possible.

“We are addressing one or two issues. Definitely we want to come out with it (coal block allocation through auction route) as quickly as possible,” Srivastava said.

Replying to a question of the recent announcements made by Finance Minister P. Chidambaram with regard to increase in basic custom and countervailing duty (CVD) and on steam coal and reduction in the basic customs duty and CVD on bituminous coal, Srivastava said that it would not have a major impact on the power tariff.

“They have just set it in a proper shape by having single import duty rather than having differential import duty and I don’t think it is going to have a very major impact in power tariff specially if you see it in the context of proposed price pooling mechanism will will come into place next year,” he said.

The Finance Minister had, in his budget speech, announced a hike in the basic customs duty on steam coal from present nil to two per cent and countervailing duty (CVD) from one per cent to two per cent.

He had also announced reduction in the basic customs duty on bituminous coal from five per cent to two per cent and CVD from six per cent to two per cent.

Initiating the process of allocation of coal mines, the government had in December invited proposals from PSUs for allotting 17 blocks to them, mostly for captive power plants.