“After the Planning Commission opposed the changes proposed by us, we approached the finance ministry, which reserves the right to amend the model concession agreement (MCA). We have also asked them to give us a clear definition of what counts as experience in a particular domain such as a railway or an aviation project,” a senior government official told The Indian Express.

The railway ministry has asked for a clear definition of indirect shareholding in the RFQ document, which is amiss in the present one. “There was no clear indication as to how we can calculate indirect shareholding when three companies are involved. We have now proposed a formula and the finance ministry may finetune it,” the official said. Indirect shareholding prevents two companies from participating in the same project bid. If company A holds shares in company B and company B holds shares in company C, a clear formula needs to be worked out on how one would calculate company A’s indirect control over C, he added.

The manner in which bidders are shortlisted will also be made clear before bidders submit bids. Rail Bhavan has asked the finance ministry to indicate whether conflict of interest (CoI) clause is to be applied first or the domain expertise is to be calculated first while assessing the bids. “If the CoI is taken first then a large number may get rejected who actually have good domain expertise,” the official said. It is understood that the government may finally place a limit of five per cent cross shareholding under the conflict of interest clause and raise it from the current one per cent suggested by Planning Commission.

On the issue of getting an experience certificate from statutory auditors for the bidding process, the railways has suggested to the finance ministry that a certificate from the director finance or managing director of the company should suffice as not only auditors can certify the company’s expertise in a particular infrastructure sector. This issue had been raised by road developers as well when a few bids got rejected as the infrastructure firms did not have the supporting document.

The final view is to be taken by the public-private-partnership appraisal committee (PPPAC), after which the players will be asked to submit bids for the project.