Thaindian News

Hyderabad, Aug 4 (IANS) The Andhra Pradesh government Wednesday awarded the Rs.12,132 crore Hyderabad Metro Rail (HMR) project to leading construction group Larsen and Toubro (L&T).
A cabinet meeting, chaired by Chief Minister K. Rosaiah, approved selection of L&T as the developer of the project and decided to release Rs.500 crore as the state government’s share in the Viability Gap Funding (VGF) for the Metro, Information and Public Relations Minister Geeta Reddy said.

The foundation stone of the project will be laid in January and the entire project is expected to be completed in five years.

A three-member evaluation committee, which evaluated the financial bids, had submitted its recommendations to the government. The recommendations were examined by law and finance departments and the same were placed before the cabinet for awarding the project to the lowest bidder.

Rosaiah recently said the project would be developed as a role model and would have more advanced features than Delhi metro.

The elevated metro system will have state of the art features like foolproof signalling system, air conditioned coaches, stations with escalators and lifts, and air conditioned feeder bus services.

The project will cover high density traffic corridors of Hyderabad spanning over 71 km - Miyapur-LB Nagar (28.87 km); JBS-Falaknuma (14.78 km); and Nagole-Shilparamam (27.51 km).

Out of six companies that bid for the project, L&T emerged as the lowest bidder seeking Rs.1,458 crore, the least from the government in terms of VGF. The central government had agreed to give Rs.2,363 under VGF.

The authorities called for fresh global bids last year after scrapping the deal with Maytas, a sister-concern of scam-hit Satyam Computer Services, as it failed to achieve financial closure.