UP sets the PPP ball rolling

Undeterred by the poor response so far to the public-private partnership projects in various sectors, the UP government has invited requests for qualification (RFQ) from the private sector for urban infrastructure development projects worth over Rs 12,500 crore for eight large cities of the state.

The project, called “Integrated Urban rejuvenation plan”, is proposed to be implemented in Lucknow, Kanpur, Agra, Aligarh, Allahabad, Meerut, Ghaziabad and Varanasi. The pre-bid meeting will be held in New Delhi on September 11 and the last date for submission of RFQ is September 23.

Lucknow tops, with projects worth Rs 3,505 crore. The urban infrastructure projects for Lucknow include an international convention centre (Rs 410 crore), a cricket stadium-cum-sports complex (Rs 100 crore), a super-specialty hospital (Rs 270 crore), an automated multi-level car parking lot (Rs 50 crore), Gomti river front development (Rs 500 crore), solid waste management (Rs 150 crore), Outer Ring Road (Rs 500 crore), a six-lane road on Ghaduddin Haider Canal (Rs 500 crore), a railway overbridge at Gomti Nagar (Rs 25 crore) and public conveniences facilities (Rs 4 crore).

Chief Minister Mayawati unveiled her new economic policy, called the New Middle Path Economic Policy, on December 24 last year and PPP was its core. She said that though the global economic scenario was changing fast, the fruits of economic development had not percolated down.

According to the PPP model adopted by UP, the state's equity will be a maximum of 49 per cent and a minimum of 11 per cent in the schemes and projects to be developed. Developing infrastructure had been accorded priority.

Also rural and urban infrastructure, including power, drinking water, roads, transport, health, and industry, had been identified as core sectors to be developed on the PPP model.

But so far the UP government's efforts to attract private capital in sugar, transport, primary health and basic education, through the PPP model, have been fruitless.