The Indian Union Ministry of Shipping and the Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) will award the fourth container terminal at JNPT to the highest bidding consortium of Port of Singapore and ABG Ports in the next two weeks, it has been revealed, ifw-net reports.
The terminal, originally slated to be awarded in 2010-11, was held up after a number of JNPT board trustees raised performance-related concerns over ABG, one of the consortium partners.
There was also controversy surrounding the terminal after APM Terminals won an 18 month legal battle to bid for the project and then dramatically decided not to tender.
APM is believed to have stated various reasons for the decision such as project’s cost escalation; lack of approach road and the requirement of additional dredging work among the factors that forced them to back out of the tender.
Yesterday ministry and port sources said the issues surrounding ABG Ports had been ironed out for the terminal that will add a further 4.8 million teu of capacity to the port’s current 4 million teu capacity.
Rakesh Srivastava, Joint Secretary (Ports), Shipping Ministry, was reported to have told local media: “The bid for fourth container terminal at JNPT will be awarded in the next two weeks. The JNPT board had certain clarifications from the preferred bidder — consortium of PSA and ABG Ports — which have now been addressed.”
The PSA-ABG consortium emerged as a preferred bidder for the project, committing 51% of the revenues to the government over a concession period of 30 years.
JPNT, which handles more than 60% of India’s total container traffic, recently reported its highest ever annual throughput, 4.27 million teu, between April 2010 and March 2011. It aims to handle 10 million teu by 2014-15.
The terminal, originally slated to be awarded in 2010-11, was held up after a number of JNPT board trustees raised performance-related concerns over ABG, one of the consortium partners.
There was also controversy surrounding the terminal after APM Terminals won an 18 month legal battle to bid for the project and then dramatically decided not to tender.
APM is believed to have stated various reasons for the decision such as project’s cost escalation; lack of approach road and the requirement of additional dredging work among the factors that forced them to back out of the tender.
Yesterday ministry and port sources said the issues surrounding ABG Ports had been ironed out for the terminal that will add a further 4.8 million teu of capacity to the port’s current 4 million teu capacity.
Rakesh Srivastava, Joint Secretary (Ports), Shipping Ministry, was reported to have told local media: “The bid for fourth container terminal at JNPT will be awarded in the next two weeks. The JNPT board had certain clarifications from the preferred bidder — consortium of PSA and ABG Ports — which have now been addressed.”
The PSA-ABG consortium emerged as a preferred bidder for the project, committing 51% of the revenues to the government over a concession period of 30 years.
JPNT, which handles more than 60% of India’s total container traffic, recently reported its highest ever annual throughput, 4.27 million teu, between April 2010 and March 2011. It aims to handle 10 million teu by 2014-15.