Kolkata, Dec 24 (IANS): Senior IAS officer S. Bhattacharya has been appointed as the chairman and managing director of state-run Coal India Ltd (CIL), an official in the company said Wednesday here.

"The formal letter of appointment has been issued and it is up to him (Bhattacharya) when he can take charge. We will have more clarity on the date of his joining Dec 26," a CIL official said.

The Public Enterprises Selection Board in November recommended the name of Bhattacharya, a 1985 batch Indian Administrative Service officer, for the post of chairman and MD of CIL after considering a total of 12 contenders for the post.

He is presently the CMD of Singareni Collieries Company.

The Maharatna public sector undertaking had been running without a full time chief for the past six months with Additional Secretary (Coal) A.K. Dubey taking the responsibility of its CMD from June 26.

Expectedly, the appointment of Bhattacharya as the new head of CIL will help it to frame the correct steps and direction to achieve its ambitious goal of achieving an annual coal production of one billion tonnes by 2019.

Coal India had missed the production target of 482 million tonnes last fiscal, with an output of 462 MT.