City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO) — the nodal agency tasked with executing the Navi Mumbai International Airport (NMIA) project — has extended the date for submission of bids yet again, to February 13.
According to sources, Tata Realty, Voluptas Developers (a Hirandanani Group company), GMR and GVK-led Mumbai International Airport (MIAL) all presented themselves at the CIDCO office on Wednesday — the date set earlier for submission of bids — and articulated their
concerns.
According to sources, Tata Realty is concerned with the lack of movement on the ground with respect to rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) of the villagers. Second, CIDCO has estimated the cost of building the terminal at R65,000 per sq metre as it has taken the new terminal at Kochi as the benchmark. However, Tata Realty believes this should be revised as NMIA will be a bigger airport. Third, the company is also concerned that CIDCO is yet to receive Stage II forest clearances for this project.
With respect to R&R, FE had visited the airport site in the second week of January and found that the villagers are reluctant to move until the R&R sites are fully ready with at least basic infrastructure in place. A CIDCO spokesperson said that water and electricity connections would be complete only by the end of 2017.
GVK has already been awarded a portion of the pre-development work for the airport, which involves the demolition of hillocks to ground level, filling up marshland and diversion of creeks and rivers in the core airport area.
Gayatri Projects has also been awarded a contract for the same in a different part of the designated area. Two more contracts for pre-development are yet to be awarded. The pre-development work alone is expected to take about two years.