The Uttar Pradesh government has decided to award the contract of developing the inner ring road at Agra to Jai Prakash Associates Ltd — the sole bidder for the project.

The road development project, pegged at Rs 1,098 crore is the first to be taken up under the Integrated Urban Rejuvenation Plan, which the state government had mooted last year to improve urban infrastructure in select cities on a public private-partnership model.

The six-lane road stretching from National Highway 2 near Kuberpur village to National Highway 3 near Rohta village will be 20.5 km long and will be developed on design-build-finance-operate and transfer (DBFOT) basis. “The letter of intent has been issued to Jai Prakash Associates Ltd. Once the firm gives its acceptance, the letter of award will be issued,” said Harminder Raj Singh, Principal Secretary, Housing and Urban Planning Department.

The bids for the project were invited thrice, but except Jai Prakash Associates Ltd no one showed interest in the project.

“It was open bidding but when no other bidder submitted bids again and again, it was decided to give the project to Jai Prakash Associates Ltd,” Singh said. Officials said they have also received and evaluated the bids for two multi-level car parks planned to be developed in Civil Lines, Allahabad and Kaushambi in Ghaziabad. The developers for the project would be finalised soon, officials added. Both the projects are estimated to cost over Rs 91 crore.

For eight other projects, the department has decided to launch the bidding process afresh. These include construction of super-specialty hospitals in Lucknow and Kanpur, a multi-specialty hospital in Agra, two multi-level car parks in Ghaziabad, two underground car parks in Varanasi and a Transport Nagar in Varanasi — all estimated to cost over Rs 1,070 crore.

... contd.