Telangana pushes HAM road projects amid opposition scam allegations

Telangana is proceeding with road development under the Hybrid Annuity Model despite opposition allegations of irregularities, with tenders evaluated and recalled where needed, as officials plan to begin works in June following agreement finalisation.

Hyderabad: Amidst the opposition allegations of scams and apprehensions expressed by contractors, the Roads and Buildings (R&B) and Panchayat Raj and Rural Development (PR&RD) departments are going ahead with development of roads under Hybrid Annuity Model (HAM).

The R&B department had floated tenders for development and maintenance of 6,092 kms road network with Rs.13,006 crore. These works are to be executed in 34 packages. Of these, bids for 31 packages qualified and bids for three packages failed to qualify. Similarly, the PR&RD department had also floated tenders under HAM. Interestingly, six bids filed for different packages failed to qualify.

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Accordingly, the departments have recalled tenders for the packages, which did not get bids as per the terms and conditions. A Technical Evaluation Committee constituted for both the departments would evaluate the bids filed by bidders for all the packages. “If all the bids meet the terms and conditions, agreements will be signed in May and works will commence from June first week,” a senior official from R&B department said.

Tenders for road development under HAM were floated last year as well. However, there was poor response from bidders, forcing officials to float the tenders again. This time, officials claim that the response has been good from bidders. This was mainly after the government agreed to the contractors condition of assuring timely installments payments to the banks so that they were not penalized for any delay by the government, officials said.

The main opposition Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) has been highlighting irregularities in the roads developments under HAM. Last month, BRS Deputy Floor Leader T Harish Rao charged that the Congress government was releasing excess mobilization advances and raising curtains for Rs.18,000 crore scam in the execution of HAM roads project in the State.