GMR argues against airport rebid

In the event of the Delhi High Court deciding to quash the award of contracts for modernisation of Delhi and Mumbai airports, the "reinitiation" of the entire tender process will not only result in waste of time but also push up the project cost, according to GMR Infrastructure Ltd.

Arguing the matter before the Delhi High Court today, senior counsel PP Venugopal, appearing for GMR, submitted that if the grounds of "mala fide and arbitrariness" as raised by the Reliance Airport Developers were made the basis for quashing the award of contracts, the entire reinitiation process would not only result in wasting time but also raise the project cost.

GMR said the rebidding process would also cause embarrassment to the country as its prestige would be affected if the deadline for the Commonwealth games was not met.

Besides, its capacity to bid for the Olympic games would be seriously jeopardised, the counsel added.

Refuting charges of mala fide in the whole selection process of the bidders, the counsel said the documents placed by the government before the court showed that fair and transparent process had been followed by various committees.

Evaluation Committee, the Government Review Committee, the Inter-ministerial Group, the Empowered Group of Ministers, Empowered group of Ministers, Committee of Secretaries, Group of Eminent Technical Experts - before the decision to award the contracts for Delhi and Mumbai airports was taken.

"This would clearly exclude any allegation of malafides being made against any individual or a group of persons," Venugopal said.

However, GMR will continue its arguments tomorrow.

The Reliance-ADA had challenged the government's decision to award the Delhi and Mumbai airport modernisation projects to GMR-Fraport and GVK-ACS, respectively.