The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) plan to reconstruct 10 bridges in Mumbai in record time has received a poor response from contractors. In the case of reconstruction of two bridges, including the Oshiwara bridge, the tender has got no response, which means the BMC will have to award its work using conventional methods. This also means work may not be completed in three to six months as expected.
Asked about the poor response to bids, Municipal Commissioner Praveen Pardeshi said, “We will examine single bids as they have to deposit 20% cost as security. If they deposit this, then we can process it as per the rules.” As regards the Oshiwara bridge, he said, “We will re-tender. Now that we have reopened the bridge, there is no urgency.”
The Hindu had reported in June that the BMC plans to use a different methodology to award the work of reconstructing 10 city bridges. The idea was that contractors can use the best technology and bring pre-fabricated bridges for installation at the site but at a higher cost. They can choose the design as well. However, they will have to complete the bridge in three to six months against the standard two years. At the time of issuing work, the contractor will have to deposit 10% of the project cost as a deposit with BMC. The deposit will be forfeited if the contractor is unable to complete the work within the stipulated time. The reconstruction of 10 bridges is slated to cost around ₹125 crore, higher than conventional methods.
The BMC had recently floated bids for the 10 bridges but has got no response for reconstruction of Gandhi Nagar-Kurar village bridge and Oshiwara Nullah (S.V. Road) bridge. Of the eight remaining bridges, there is only a single bidder in case of three, while there are two bidders in case of the others. For the bridges that only have a single bidder, the administration will have to take a decision on whether to go ahead with it as generally, contracts are awarded from among competition. Where there are two bidders, their documents are being scrutinised to check if they qualify for the job, after which price bids will be opened.
Since the corporation wanted to prepare for such a situation, it had readied tender documents for inviting bids through conventional methods too. However, in this method, the designs and bill of quantity are created by the BMC, while the work is awarded to the contractor and therefore, takes longer.
“In case of the two that did not elicit a response, we will use the conventional method. We will reduce the time period granted in this method. It is unfortunate that we did not get bidders. Generally, we get only up to three bidders as construction of bridges is a difficult job,” said a senior bridges department official. Thus, work on the Oshiwara and Kurar bridges will take much longer than anticipated. The remaining ones are still shrouded in uncertainty.
