A meeting of the nine-member ministerial panel set up to frame the powers of the proposed regulator for the coal sector remained inconclusive today.

However, a general consensus emerged on the contentious issue of assigning pricing power to the proposed authority. This, if implemented, would deprive state-owned Coal India Ltd (CIL), the near-monopoly producer, of the freedom it currently enjoys in fixing and revising prices of its output. “Views of different ministries were heard on the draft Bill on constitution of the coal regulatory authority in today’s meeting. There were no objections from any quarter on the pricing issue,” a senior official told Business Standard.