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Decision on airport bids on Jan 24

     New Delhi: Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel said here on Saturday that all formalities pertaining to award of final bids for the modernisation of Delhi and Mumbai airports would be taken on January 24. Talking to reporters on the sidelines of fourth Auto Summit organised by Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations, Patel said that the government has asked some clarification from the Sreedharan Committee on its recommendations. "When the Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) meets here on January 24 we expect to take a decision," said Patel. "By January 31, all formalities will be completed. We will finalise the joint venture partner by January 31," he added. An Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM), which had met on Thursday, had asked for some clarification from the E Sreedharan committee on evaluation of bids and procedures for the Rs 5,400 crore modernisation plans of the two metro airports. The committee headed by Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) chief E Sreedharan, which was set up to re-evaluate the bids for modernising the two metro airports, has submitted its report to the cabinet secretary recently. The committee reportedly eliminated consortium led by Reliance by downgrading its bid and endorsed the Airport Authority of India's proposal to form a Special Purpose Vehicle for the modernisation.

    Meanwhile, Left Parties today demanded the Prime Minister's intervention in the issue saying that the eligibility criteria of the bid process should not the altered as it could put a question mark on government's credibility.. In a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, CPI(M) Rajya Sabha member Dipankar Mukherjee said the Ministry had, in reply to his letter, stated that the restructuring process was at a "very crucial and stage" and "no relaxation or change in any of the eligibility criteria" was being contemplated. "I am therefore shocked that within a fortnight, Government has changed its stand and the empowered Group of Ministers (eGoM) is reportedly trying to pressurise even Sreedharan Committee to re- examine all bids and to tap top three bids for each airports with an ostensible aim to dilute the eligibility criteria," he said. "This clearly shows that reason other than urgency of modernisation of airports is dictating the so-called transparent bidding process", added Mukherjee. The government had received six bids for restructuring the Mumbai airport and five for the Delhi airport. The five bidders for Delhi airport included GMR in a tie-up with the operators of the Frankfurt airport, Fraport; Reliance, which had submitted a bid with ASA Mexico; D.S. Construction that had a tie-up with the Munich airport; Macquire that tied up with Airport de Paris; and the Essel Group in association with the Turkish airport operator TAV. For the Mumbai airport, the government has also received a bid from the GVK group that has a tie-up with the South African Airport.
-Jan 14,  2006

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