In a first, effective 1 January 2026, Coal India (CIL) has permitted coal consumers located in the neighbouring countries like Bangladesh, Bhutan and Nepal, who wish to import coal from India, to directly participate in the Single Window Mode Agnostic (SWMA) auctions conducted by the company.

CIL's Board has cleared the decks recently for this move, tweaking the scheme's mechanism in the SWMA auction.

“Opening SWMA e-auctions to foreign buyers reflects CIL's calibrated approach to market expansion while fully safeguarding domestic coal requirements. This step enhances transparency, competition and global market integration” said a senior company official.

Under the revised framework, foreign buyers can participate alongside domestic buyers in SWMA auction. Earlier, access to CIL's coal by coal consumers across the borders was only through domestic coal traders who were allowed to buy and sell coal without any end use restrictions.

All operational and procedural modalities have been incorporated in the updated Scheme. Key provisions for foreign buyers include one-time registration, participation through digital bidding, advance electronic payments and export through notified logistics channels.

Payment process would be transparent as per Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) rules. While buyers from Nepal can make the payments in INR as well as US Dollar, buyers from the other two countries are required to affect their payment in US Dollars, valuation of which would be on INR.

Earlier, CIL had dialogues with the prospective coal consumers from abroad to categorize the enabling clauses and gauge their need of coal.