The project is funded by the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), formerly known as Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund (OECF). The contract was awarded to the joint venture despite JBIC conveying, through its various letters to NHAI and the ministry, its displeasure at the deviations in the joint venture's technical proposal.

In one such letter, dated November 9, 1999, a copy of which is available with The Financial Express, Hiroshi Oita, chief Indian representative of the Japanese lending agency, had even stated that if the issues raised by them "cannot be solved in due course, JBIC would not be able to support NHAI's future projects".

Though speaking to The Financial Express, Oita said that now the lending agency was fully satisfied with the ministry's decision and points raised by them had been clarified, other bidders question that if the original Hyundai-HCC technical proposal and its subsequent evaluation by NHAI did not meet with the specifications, their financial bid should not have been considered in the first place.

Hyundai Engineering & Construction has denied that there was any change in the technical specification to suit their proposal. In a faxed reply to a questionnaire, the company maintained: "We were technically qualified as per the tender requirements and our financial bid was opened only after we were technically qualified and advised of this fact officially."

However, JBIC and NHAI communication over the technicalities went on for over an year and a half, a fact confirmed by Oita. JBIC asked for clarifications till as late as November 1999. However, as per the ministry's press release, NHAI invited financial bids in August 1998 and after a pre-bid meeting in October received the bids on November 1998.

The release also said that pre-qualification of contractors was finalised by the ministry of surface transport in consultation with JBIC in June 1998 though JBIC did not seemed to have been convinced till late last year.

Among those who were shortlisted were Hyundai-HCC joint venture, BESIX-Marubeni-Uttar Pradesh State Bridge Corporation-Gammon India joint venture, Skanska, Kvaerner and Kaijma Corporation of Japan.

Interestingly, other bidders point out that taking into consideration the devaluation of rupee since November 1998 with respect to US dollar, the Hyundai-HCC price bid, which has 45 per cent dollar component, works out to be higher than that of the second lowest bidder. However, Hyundai maintained that they are the lowest evaluated responsive bidder taking into account the foreign exchange impact as per the tender procedure.

Another point, which seems to point a finger towards the award of contract, is that as per the tender, it is a prerequisite for pre-qualification that the tenderer or any of its joint venture partners in its earlier project of similar nature should have completed work on time and also not be involved with any incident of default, dispute or non-performance.

However, as per local media reports, Penang bridge in Malaysia and Jamuna multipurpose bridge in Bangladesh constructed by Hyundai had allegedly developed cracks.

The Naini project involves construction of a 630 metre cable stayed bridge across river Yamuna, 3.913 km long approach along new alignment of NH 27 and an under pass at the crossing of proposed road alignment with the existing railway line.

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) had granted administrative approval for the project way back in 1993. The revised project estimate, amounting to Rs 294.7 crore, was approved by CCEA in its meeting on August 26, 1999.

The loan agreement for the project was signed with JBIC on January 24, 1994 for Rs 348 crore totalling to Yen 10.037 million. The construction of the bridge and its approaches are scheduled to be completed in 40 months.

This is the first cable stayed bridge of its kind in the country. The only other major cable stayed bridge in the country is the second Hoogly bridge, Vidyasagar Sethu, in West Bengal.