Airport upgrade bids to be finalised on Dec 5

The empowered group of ministers (EGoM) is expected to finalise the technical bids for upgrade of the Delhi and Mumbai airports on December 5.

According to officials from the civil aviation ministry, "All the bids, along with the report of the technical advisor, will be sent to the EGoM, which will take a final call on the issue."

Officials added that the inter-ministerial group (IMG) of officials, expected to meet on December 2, will also evaluate the bids.

"The government has not finalised the bidders. The report of the technical advisor will be examined by the IMG, after which it will be taken to the GoM which will finalise the bidders," he said.

Six companies "" Reliance, Essel, Sterlite, DS Construction, GMR and GVK "" have submitted technical and financial bids for the project.

As per the conditions laid down by the government, companies that bag the Delhi airport project will have to invest Rs 2,800 crore in the first five years, while in Mumbai, the minimum investment in the first five years has to be Rs 2,600 crore.

"The EGoM, based on the report of the consultant, will decide on short-listing of bidders." said a civil aviation ministry official. The ministry expects to finalise and award the contract by the December-end.

"The evaluation of financial bids will take about three to four weeks to conclude," said the official. The development of the airport project will be done in two phases, with the first phase of the Delhi airport expected to be complete by 2009.

Meanwhile, Airports Authority of India (AAI) employees today staged a protest against the government's move to privatise the two airports.

Left leaders are seeking an explanation on why the task was not being assigned to AAI at a lower price and a shorter time-frame.

The employees are of the view that shortlisting of lesser number of bidders would kill competition. The protest comes two days after the AAI employees joint forum made a presentation to a panel of the civil aviation ministry regarding modernisation of the two airports on the basis of the alternate plan they had submitted to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in September.