Coal instead of gold.

India spends 45% of its total import bill on oil and gold imports, $169 billion was spent on importing foreign oil in the last fiscal. Hence the fall in the international prices of gold and oil led to great rejoicing among politicians and friends that Core Inflation rate will fall which will enable them to scream at the Reserve Bank for a cut in interest rates. Sadly JP Morgan ( India ) does not think so. Livemint, 23 April. JP Morgan reckons that any savings will be more than equaled by increased spending in other areas. 1. Iron ore production is down because of legal and environmental reasons. Illegal mining was costing the country billions of dollars every year and the Supreme Court has shut down all such mines. Some Indian companies raise false allegations of environmental damage against rivals to harm their interests. India is already having to import steel scrap and may have to import iron ore. 2. Persistent weakness in commodity prices means a slowdown in the global economy which may reduce our exports. 3. India may have to import fertiliser because of problems with production of natural gas. 4. We will have to import coal because coal mines were allocated to family and friends and have yet to produce any coal. India has 286 billion tonnes of coal and 41 million tonnes of lignite, the fifth largest reserves in the world. Yet power plants are not producing power at full capacity because of a shortage of coal. TOI, 29 April. Between 1993 and 2008, 195 coal blocks were awarded, of which 160 were awarded between 2004 and 2008 by this Congress led government, and only 30 are operational. These 195 blocks have reserves of 44 billion tonnes and we will consume just 770 million tonnes in 2013-14, of which 600 million tonnes will be produced domestically and 165 million tonnes will have to be imported. Coal India is a government owned monolith which like every government institution is totally incompetent. Private companies which were allocated coal blocks were just sitting on them hoping to sell out at a higher price. One company given a captive coal block for a steel plant did not own any steel plant. Even after 13 years it was still trying to buy one. Companies had no intention of producing power or steel but wanted to sell the coal in the open market at a profit of 800-8000%. China is a prime example of crony capitalism where local politicians and business fellows have combined to grab land from peasants and construct huge factories supplying the world. This has made it the second richest country in the world. Cuba is poor but its socialist government provides free education and health care better than that of the US. We are cursed in that the Congress loots taxpayer money for fraudulent socialist schemes while indulging in the vilest form of crony capitalism to loot our resources. Coal or gold, they fill their pockets.