National Coal Index

Ministry of Coal has started commercial auction of coal mines on revenue share basis. In order to arrive at the revenue share based on market prices of coal, National Coal Index (NCI) was rolled out on 4th June, 2020.

The concept and design of the Index as well as the Representative Prices have been developed by the Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata. NCI is a price index combining the prices of coal from all the sales channels - Notified Prices, Auction Prices and Import Prices.

Following principles were kept in view while designing the NCI:

  1. Monthly Computability
  2. Forward Looking
  3. Ability to capture the coal trades in India

All grades of coal and all sales channel as existing in 2017-18 are covered. Base of the NCI has been taken as FY 2017-18. NCI is the weighted average of the change in price level of coal with price level of FY 2017-18. NCI is compiled for a group of Grades of Coal (five sub-indices):

  1. Non Coking Top Grade: G1 to G6
  2. Non Coking Medium Grade: G7-G14
  3. Non Coking Low Grade: G15-G17
  4. Coking Top Grade: Steel-I and Steel-II
  5. Coking Bottom Grade: Washery-I to Washery-IV

For each Sub-index, the prices of three sales channels - Notified Prices, Auction Prices and Import Prices have been taken into account, as relevant.