Big firms stay away from BMC's road contracts

The failure of Mumbai's civic body Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), the richest in India, to attract reputed infrastructure companies to bid for its multi-crore road contracts, does not come as a surprise. The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation(BMC) attempted to weed out dubious contractors with alleged political connections.

It was their shoddy work which resulted in bad quality roads which forced the administration to make tender conditions more stringent. But apparently it did not work as the BMC found out last week.

When bids were opened, the list contained the same set of contractors who were earlier penalised for poor quality work. To get around the stringent rules, these small-time contractors entered into joint ventures with bigger firms, and even hired cement plants for a few months to show they were capable of executing large projects.