Hyd Metro seeks clarity from firms

Hyderabad Metro Rail Limited (HMRL), the special purpose vehicle implementing the metro rail project, has sought clarity on various issues from the eight companies that are in the fray to implement the project. It has asked them to submit the information by February 3.

In a statement, HMRL managing director NVS Reddy said clarity had been sought on period and percentage of equity shareholding in the projects indicated for technical experience, proper certification by statutory auditors for networth, authority for issuing power of attorney in favour of signatories and the lead members among others.

The pre-qualification exercise would be completed in a few days after the companies submit their response, he said.

L&T, Lanco-OHL (Spain), Reliance (Anil Ambani group), Essar-Leighton (Australia)-Gayatri-VNR consortium, GVK-Samsung consortium, GMR, Transstroy-OJSC (Russia)-CR 18 9 (China)-BEML consortium and Soma-Strabag (Austria) consortium have submitted their pre-qualification applications.

A new concessionaire would be in place by the end of April and groundwork on the project is expected to begin in October this year.

This is the second time that the Andhra Pradesh government had invited bids for the 71.16-km rail route on three corridors. The government had cancelled the project awarded to Maytas Infra, a company earlier promoted by the family of Satyam Computer Services Limited founder B Ramalinga Raju, as it failed to achieve financial closure by March 2009.