Civic body issues work orders to 5 contractors to concretise roads

The BMC had last November floated a Rs 6,070-crore tender to concretise 397 km of roads. Last week, Shiv Sena (UBT) MLA from Worli, Aaditya Thackeray, had alleged that the BMC had floated the tenders based on inflated cost. Following this, sources said civic officials had renegotiated with the bidders, asking them to carry out the work at 6-8 per cent lesser cost.

However, sources in the BMC said that the bidders didn’t turn up for the negotiation and the work orders were issued on the condition that the works need to be carried out at “revised rates”.

Civic officials said the revised rates would save BMC an additional Rs 380-Rs 410 crore. In case the contractors refuse to work as per the revised rates, then the BMC may issue a “letter of regret”, cancelling the order, said sources.

The five shortlisted contractors are companies based in Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Ulhasnagar and Pune. All had previously worked on major infrastructure projects under the Union and several state governments. The projects include Samruddhi Mahamarg, Zozila Tunnel, Lokmanya Tilak Terminus (Kurla) as well as state and national highways in Mumbai.

Earlier this week, Aaditya had also written to municipal commissioner and state-appointed administrator, Iqbal Singh Chahal, alleging cartelisation of the road tender. On Wednesday, in a series of tweets, he took a dig on Chief Minister Eknath Shinde.

There’s an absolute silence from the unconstitutional CM on my challenge to him over the Mega Road Tenders of BMC.
My challenge to him remains.

I want to know from @mybmc if work orders have been issued.
• If so, at what rates?
• Has it mentioned “no escalation”?
(1/n)

— Aaditya Thackeray (@AUThackeray) January 18, 2023

“There’s an absolute silence from the unconstitutional CM on my challenge to him over the Mega Road Tenders of BMC. My challenge to him remains. I want to know from @mybmc if work orders have been issued, If so, at what rates? Has it mentioned ‘no escalation’? As I mentioned yesterday, I am happy to understand directly from the unconstitutional CM of Khoke Sarkar of how these mega tenders have been managed in Scale, dipped in Scam and fit into Setting of cartelization,” he tweeted.

The BMC, meanwhile, said in the statement that tenders were floated and processed after receiving inputs from MPs, MLAs and former corporators.

The civic body has verified the documents of the eligible bidders before handing out work orders, it added.