Fresh Vande Bharat tenders in a week

The Indian Railways will invite tenders within a week for procurement of Vande Bharat Express or Train 18, Railway Board Chairman V K Yadav said on Sunday.

This was the third time that tenders for Vande Bharat Express were cancelled. The third tender for 43 train sets floated in December last year was cancelled on Friday.

The bidding goes through two stages — technical bids and financial bids. Financial bids of those who qualified in the first stage are only opened in the second stage. To bring in transparency in evaluation, financial bids are not available to tender evaluation panel. “While evaluating the technical bids, the committee noticed that some of the details of financial offers have been revealed in the first packet,” Yadav said.

To maintain complete transparency, the committee recommended cancelling this tender and invite fresh tenders. “The tender accepting authority or the general manager of the Integral Coach Factory (ICF) in Chennai has accepted the committee’s recommendations,” said Yadav.

He said fresh tenders would be invited according to revised public procurement policy under Make in India. As part of the Atmanirbhar Bharat initiative, the railways is raising indigenous content from the present level of 50 per cent in the fresh rounds.

“We are trying to save the timeline, too. However, there will be a three-month delay in the initial stage,” he said.