**4. Role of continuous miner in Indian coal mechanization**

The new era of mechanized underground coal mining in India started with the implementation of continuous miner in 2002 [44]. Since then, there has been a steady



#### **Table 2.**

*Evolution of continuous miner.*

increase in continuous miners implemented in Indian coal mines with increasing mechanization and safety in underground mines. But most of the 213 underground coal mines are still highly dependent on conventional mining. This is high time to adopt complete mechanized mining in all underground coal mines with continuous miner technology.

Even though continuous miner is a major change in mechanization and safety in Indian coal mines, but still are not able to increase underground coal production due to adverse strata conditions, lack of implementing the suitable mining method prior to existing geo-mining conditions, lack of understanding of the caving nature of overlying strata before starting depillaring, which eventually results in a loss in production by leaving the number of pillars untouched in safety point of view. Undoubtedly, the future of Indian underground coal mining lies in successful pillar extraction with continuous miners. This is high time to study the stability parameters influencing the continuous miner panel workings in underground coal mines. Evolution of continuous Miner [45–48] is shown in **Table 2**.

