KATHMANDU, Jan 26: The Supreme Court on Sunday quashed the petitions filed by Laxmi Intercontinental Pvt Ltd to scrap the bidding process with regard to developing Pokhara Cable-Car Project.
With the decision, the government will now be able to implement the 1.5-km cable car service extending from Phewa Lake to the World Peace Stupa at Pumdi Bhumdi.
A division bench comprosing of Justices Baidyanath Upadhyaya and Jagadish Sharma Paudel quashed the plea filed by Laxmi Intercontinental on Sunday.
The Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport had solicited expressions of interest (EOI) from the private sector to develop and manage the project under the build-own-operate-transfer (BOOT) model on February 22, 2012.
In response, five firms had submitted EOIs and the ministry had shortlisted three joint venture firms from among them and asked them to submit requests for proposal (RFP).
The three short listed groups were Lama Construction in association with United Builders and Engineers as well as Shahiba International, Laxmi Intercontinental in association with Sujal Foods and French company Pomagalski SAS Exclusivity Co-operation and Manakamana Darshan Chitwan Co-E in association with Austrian company Doppelmayr.
After receiving the RFPs and studying the proposals the ministry had decided to award the project to Manakamana Darshan Chitwan Co-E.
But dissatisfied with the selection, Laxmi Intercontinental moved the Supreme Court claiming that the selection was not fair.
Likewise, Chandra Kanta Bhattarai and five others also moved the apex court with a public interest litigation (PIL) arguing that the ministry´s decision to consider the financial proposal of only the Manakamana Darshan Co-E would establish monopoly and the nation would earn less revenue while the public might be made to pay more for the service.
Likewise, Chandra Kanta Bhattarai and five others also moved the apex court with a public interest litigation (PIL) arguing that the ministry´s decision to consider the financial proposal of only the Manakamana Darshan Co-E would establish monopoly and the nation would earn less revenue while the public might be made to pay more for the service.
Following the PIL, a single bench of Justice Sushila Karki had issued an interim order on August 6, 2013 to stall the project until final verdict.
It was reported in 2012 that the ministry had earlier planned to award the project to Manakamana Darshan Chitwan CO-E without competaive bidding, but had later decided to go for competitive bids following an order by the National Planning Commission.
Source: eKantipur
No comments:
Post a Comment