Coal Secretary Vikram Dev Dutt said on Wednesday that the Ministry is “actively” working with Coal India (CIL), to incentivise home-grown machinery manufacturers to produce mining equipment.

“There is an element of import dependence especially in the import of heavy equipment. Although there are segments and elements where we have fairly good indigenous manufacturing capability, but we are actively working in close collaboration with CIL to see how indigenous manufacturing systems for machinery could be incentivised. So that is something work in progress,” he said.

Speaking at the curtain-raiser event for International Mining Equipment & Minerals Exhibition (IME) 2025, Dutt said the thought process of the government is clearly aligned towards indigenisation and self-sufficiency in mining equipment.

Coal India (CIL), which accounts for 80 per cent of the production and despatch of coal in the country, imports high-capacity equipment, including electric rope shovels, hydraulic shovels, dumpers, crawler dozers, drills, motor graders, front-end loaders, etc.

Promoting manufacturing of mining equipment in the country will also boost the Make In India programme.

Dutt said efforts are being made to blend domestic coal to some extent in imported coal-based (ICB) plants to lower the import dependence of thermal coal.

The Central Electricity Authority (CEA) is working on a technical evaluation and based on there would be further consideration on what quantum of imported coal can be replaced with domestic coal at ICB plants.