There’s an ongoing effort on the part of the Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) to deny contracts to the Kalamassery unit of the HMT Machine Tools, the only profit-making unit of the central PSU, allege trade unions and the senior formations of the unit.
They maintain that a recent tender for a specialised machine floated by the Ordnance Factory, Kanpur, had incorporated a condition that the original manufacturers of the equipment should not be bidding for the contract.
“Given that HMT has designed, developed and delivered similar equipment — shell turn machines worth ₹4 crore apiece — to various ordnance factories since 1995, the clause is meant to deprive us of the contract. It is even more damaging given that 90% of our business is in the defence sector,” said a senior functionary of HMT.
CM Bidar, general manager of HMT, Kalamassery, said Ordnance Factory, Kanpur, had an original requirement for 14 such machines. “But when they floated a tender for four, only HMT Machine Tools, Kalamassery, responded. The single vendor situation forced them to cancel the bid and reissue it. When the scenario repeated, the tender was issued a third time and our bid qualified technically. The price bid will be opened soon.”
“However, when the board issued a tender for a second batch of four shell turn machines, they incorporated a clause disallowing original equipment manufacturers from responding to it. When I raised it with OFB officials, they said the effort was to find another source for the equipment, but the fact remains that the machines we’ve supplied have been competitively priced and well-performing. If they were to import them, it would be more time consuming and overpriced,” said Mr Bidar.
The unit and the trade unions have sought the intervention of Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and Parliament members from the State to appeal to the ordnance factories not to turn their face away from HMT.
In fact, when Kalamalassery MLA V.K. Ibrahim Kunju raised it in the Assembly, Mr. Vijayan said that the government was duty-bound to protect the interests of the PSU and would appeal to the Centre to extend all support for ensuring its modernisation and award of all deserving contracts.
Data shows that of the ₹64.84 crore business done by the unit in 2016-17, ordnance factories accounted for ₹24.95 crore. The unit has orders worth ₹6.79 crore from ordnance factories in the ongoing financial year, which would be ₹16.40 crore if the HMT unit was allowed to take part in the controversial tender issued in July this year.
Altogether, the unit has orders worth ₹63 crore right now.
