Parivartan is here, at least in tenders!
JULIAN D’CRUZ
PANJIM: Fourteen months into “Parivartan”, the change promised by the BJP regime may or may not be visible in too many spheres of governance. In one area, however, this change is clear and present ~ major projects worth crores of rupees have been repeatedly re-tendered by the current dispensation.
The list of all projects, big and small, re-tendered is quite long. To take just five of the most important development projects that are getting delayed due to this re-tendering spree, as it were, these are the High Security Registration Plates (Transport Department), the Sewerage Scheme for Taleigao, Dona Paula and Caranzalem (PWD), Mining Corridor (GSIDC), Appointment of Consultant for New Ferry Routes (River Navigation Department) and the Beach and Water Patrol Services (Tourism Department). The ministers’ re-tendering overdrive vis-à-vis these works is evident from the fact that in some of the cases the projects/works have been re-tendered once, others twice and in one case even four times!
That is so in the case of the sewerage scheme for Taleigao, Caranzalem and Dona Paula where a tender is due to be issued for a crucial section ~ Part IV of Phase II (estimated cost Rs 9 crore) ~ for the fifth time. The delay due to repeated re-tendering is likely to significantly delay the commissioning of the entire Rs 134-crore project.
The High Security Registration Plates (HSRP) has also been subjected to re-tendering, now for the third time. While it was tendered first by the Congress government in 2008, it was tendered again during the BJP government after it took over in March 2012 and is being re-tendered by the same dispensation this year too.
The proposal of the BJP government to utilize Goa’s inland waterways to ease congestion on the roads and ease the burden on surface transport by identifying new ferry routes has also gone for a bit of a toss. More than a year after it floated tenders to appoint a Consultant to identify the routes, it has scrapped an already-conducted mammoth exercise of selecting a consultant and now proposes to directly float expressions of interests for procurement of marine vessels for introducing ferry and launch services on new routes.
The re-tendering process has hit not only the waterways but the highways as well, with the government ~ through the GSIDC ~ cancelling the Rs 86- crore contract of the first phase of the mining corridor. This, again, is going to be re-tendered after “assessing the quantum of work left to be completed,” a top official told Herald. In this case, the tenders were awarded to a party that had quoted 24.06 per cent below the estimated cost.
The most recent case is that of the tenders for beach and water patrol services which had reached the final stage but are now proposed to be re-tendered on grounds that there were objections to the process. The estimated cost is Rs 200 crore over a five-year period. The process, which began in April and should have been completed by June 15 when the previous contract lapsed, is now in limbo as it is being re-tendered.
AT A GLANCE
Mining Corridor (Phase I, Uguem to Guddemol)
Notice Inviting Tenders (NIT): March 29, 2010
Estimated cost: Rs 86.59 crore
Tenders opened: July 30, 2010
Work awarded: March 2, 2011
Completion date: January 15, 2012
Extended till: May 31, 2013
Contract terminated & works re-tendered: May 24, 2013
Beach & Water Patrol Services
Notice Inviting Tenders: April 30, 2013
Tenders opened: June 18, 2013
Decision taken to re-tender: July 1, 2013
Appointment of Consultancy service to identify New Ferry Routes
Tenders floated: July 2012
July 2013: Decision to scrap the tenders for appointing consultant; instead, government to invite expression of interest to procure marine vessels directly for new routes
HSRP
First tender floated: August 2008
Contract terminated: January 2010
Fresh tenders of March 2011 called off in May’12
Government decides to re-tender
Sewerage Scheme for Taleigao, Dona Paula & Caranzalem
Tendering process began for Part IV of Phase II in Oct/Nov 2011, re-tendered four times the last being in October 2012. Rs 134 crore is the estimated cost for the entire project (Phases 1 to 4), Rs 9 crore for Part IV of Phase II.
