Billionaire Gautam Adani's port-to-energy conglomerate on Thursday said it had won a contract to supply imported coal to state-owned electricity generator NTPC but played down its significance saying the volume of 1 million tonnes was small.
"NTPC has awarded the contract to the company for the supply of 1 million tonnes of imported coal to its various power plants," Adani Enterprises said in a stock exchange filing.
The contract, it said, was awarded by NTPC through "an elaborate bidding process (that) started in the end of October 2021, followed by reverse bidding and negotiations."
As the news of NTPC sourcing coal from Adani got traction on social media, the group clarified that "the quantum of this order is a small quantity in overall import coal business of the company."
"To put things in perspective, it may be noted that till 2015-16 NTPC was procuring imported coal in excess of 10 million tonnes and total imports of coal in the state-owned power sector in 2015-16 was around 45 million tonnes," the company said.
NTPC had also floated a tender on behalf of Kolkata-based Damodar Valley Corporation Ltd (DVC), also state-owned, for procurement of 1 million tonnes imported coal for plants of DVC.
"The company has submitted its offer against this tender also. However, the company has no information or communication either from DVC or from NTPC on this tender," Adani Enterprises Ltd (AEL) said.
Responding to a stock market notice, it said "there is nothing so significant/ material in an award of a small contract which merits announcement to the stock exchanges."
"It is part of routine business activity," it said. "Incidentally, 1.00 million tonnes quantity is merely 2 per cent of the likely volume of import coal trade business of AEL in 2021-22.
(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Dear Reader,
Business Standard has always strived hard to provide up-to-date information and commentary on developments that are of interest to you and have wider political and economic implications for the country and the world. Your encouragement and constant feedback on how to improve our offering have only made our resolve and commitment to these ideals stronger. Even during these difficult times arising out of Covid-19, we continue to remain committed to keeping you informed and updated with credible news, authoritative views and incisive commentary on topical issues of relevance.
We, however, have a request.
As we battle the economic impact of the pandemic, we need your support even more, so that we can continue to offer you more quality content. Our subscription model has seen an encouraging response from many of you, who have subscribed to our online content. More subscription to our online content can only help us achieve the goals of offering you even better and more relevant content. We believe in free, fair and credible journalism. Your support through more subscriptions can help us practise the journalism to which we are committed.
Support quality journalism and subscribe to Business Standard.
Digital Editor
RECOMMENDED FOR YOU