The AAI employees are also worried about their jobs. The Union civil aviation ministry has stated that the two winners—GMR in case of Delhi and the GVK group in Mumbai—have agreed to retain the full staff for three years, eventually reducing to 60 per cent. Between 10-15 per cent of the total staff will be retained by the AAI for services that'll continued to be rendered by the authority and the remaining will be transferred to other AAI-operated airports. Nitin Jadhav, joint secretary, Airports Authority Employees Union, disputes this contention. "Can you believe what a politician says? They say everything is right now, but later, the new management will slowly start throwing us out. Then, the government will not be able to hold them to anything," he says.
Even the private bidders are peeved for various reasons. Initially, they say that norms were twisted and turned by the government-appointed consultants at the technical bids stage to accommodate the Reliance group. It was alleged that both the consultants,ABN Amro and Amarchand Mangaldas, were close to Reliance and, therefore, there was a conflict of interest. The Reliance group denied the charges, saying the consultants were appointed before the bidders appeared on the scene. Later, Reliance's technical bid was downgraded and only one of the bidders, GMR, managed to stay above the technical benchmarks. In an effort to induce competition, the government lowered the technical criteria to allow other bidders to remain in the fray.
On January 31, the financial bids of five players were opened and it was clear that the one who emerges as the No. 1 financially in each city will win the contract. It didn't happen that way. At the last minute, the government decided that the No. 2 in Delhi—the GMR group—will be allowed to match the financial bid of the winner, the Reliance group. GMR did it and got the Delhi contract. However, in Mumbai, the winner of the financial bid, the GVK group, was awarded the contract. The logic was that since GMR was the only one that cleared the original technical parameters, it should be given a chance.
Obviously, Reliance didn't agree and, this time, it criticised the entire process as unfair. Sterlite, another bidder whose financial bid hadn't been considered, voiced its own concerns. It contended that once GMR had accepted to take Delhi, its financial bid for Mumbai shouldn't have been opened. Instead, the next bidder In line, Sterlite, should have been allowed to participate in the process. A battery of lawyers hired by Reliance and Sterlite are poring through documents to collect evidence to prove that the bidding process wasn't transparent.
Sources say that Reliance is working on two assumptions. One, it's trying to establish that a couple of members of the inter-ministerial group, which took a number of key decisions, are close to the GMR group, which is developing the Hyderabad airport. In fact, the two members are directors in the company implementing the Hyderabad project. Two, it's digging out legal precedents to prove that tender conditions were changed arbitrarily and without adequate warning. Also, the Reliance group contends that the fact that GMR would be given a chance to match the financial bid winner was conveyed a couple of hours before the bids were opened on January 31.
The stage is set for a legal battle as the Reliance group has moved the Delhi High Court. Experts say Reliance may stand a chance if tender documents don't specify clearly that the tenderer (the government) can change certain conditions. The civil aviation ministry says that nothing was changed in the tender process. Initially, the technical criteria were downgraded on the advice of the technical committee and it didn't amount to any change as it offered an equal chance to all bidders. Later, the GMR group was given a valid chance in Delhi because of its clear technical superiority. "It would have been a travesty of justice if GMR hadn't got any contract," says a senior bureaucrat in the civil aviation ministry.
Whatever might be the truth, domestic passengers will have to wait before they walk into swank and sleek airports with global standards. Until then, we can only say "we're sorry for the delay due to technical reasons and the inconvenience is regretted".
The Tarmac Is Grey
Civil aviation shudders as protests, legal action greet the airport privatisation plan <a href=pti_coverage.asp?gid=108 target=_blank> Updates</a>