Coal India Ltd (CIL) recorded its highest-ever monthly coal supplies in October, crossing the 70-million-tonne (MT) mark for the first time, as the state-owned miner stepped up production and evacuation to meet the requirements of thermal power plants amid rising power demand in the country.
The company supplied 70.3 MT of coal during October 2026, registering a 19 per cent increase over 59.2 MT in the corresponding month of the previous financial year. The previous monthly record was 69.4 MT, achieved in March 2026.
Supplies to the power sector also touched an all-time monthly high of 57.1 MT, surpassing the previous record of 56.5 MT recorded in May 2024. The October supplies were 19 per cent higher than the 48 MT supplied to the sector in October 2025. Recently, several power plants in the country hit critically low levels of coal stocks, raising concerns over power shortages.
The record performance also comes against the backdrop of India’s reduced coal imports. India’s total coal imports declined 5.83 per cent to 104.57 MT in August 2026 from 111.05 MT in the corresponding month a year ago, according to an official statement from the Ministry of Coal on Sunday.
The decline was particularly sharp in imports for blending at domestic coal-based power plants, which fell 35.23 per cent to 3 MT in August 2026 from 4.64 MT in August 2025. Coal imports by power plants overall declined 6.39 per cent to 21.32 MT from 22.77 MT during the same period.
The share of imported coal in India’s total coal consumption also declined to 19.30 per cent in August 2026 from 21.20 per cent a year earlier, a reduction of 1.90 percentage points.
However, imports by imported coal-based power plants registered a marginal increase of 0.98 per cent to 18.31 MT in August, compared with 18.13 MT a year earlier. Coking coal imports, an important raw material for the steel industry, declined 4.18 per cent to 27.30 MT from 28.49 MT. The ministry said import requirements for coking coal continued to be influenced by the specific raw material requirements of the steel sector, given constraints in the quality and characteristics of indigenous reserves.
CIL’s coal production during October stood at 67.2 MT, the highest ever for the month in any financial year. This was around 19 per cent higher than the 56.38 MT produced in October last year and surpassed the previous October record of 62.47 MT, achieved in 2024.
CIL said railway evacuation also registered a new milestone, with the company recording an average power-sector loading of 310 rakes per day during October, the highest monthly average in CIL’s history. The average loading had last crossed the 300-rake mark in March 2025, when it stood at 302.8 rakes per day.
A senior CIL official said the achievement was significant because the previous supply and railway rake-loading records, which were set in March, typically the peak performance month of a financial year, had been surpassed in October.
CIL’s subsidiary Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd (MCL) also crossed the 20 MT monthly supply mark for the first time during October, contributing to the company’s overall performance.
