Andhra Pradesh government's U-turn on Swiss Challenge method
The state government had appealed against the single judge's order.
Hyderabad: The AP government on Wednesday took a U-turn and decided to withdraw its earlier notifications inviting competitive bids under the Swiss Challenge method to develop the start up area in Amaravati and to issue fresh notifications.
The CRDA on July 17, 2016, had issued a notification, inviting request for proposal to develop the startup area in the capital city in competition to the original proposal offered by the Singapore Consortium.
When Aditya Housing & Infrastructure Development Ltd and Envian Engineers Pvt Ltd moved the High Court challenging the notification, the CRDA issued an addendum-cum-corrigendum on August 28.
A single judge had stayed both notifications on grounds that the method followed by the state government in inviting the RFP was not transparent, and non-disclosure of revenue share offered by the Singapore consortium was against the provisions of the AP Infrastructure Development Enabling Act and against procedure under the Swiss Challenge Method.
The state government had appealed against the single judge’s order. When the appeal came up for hearing before a division bench comprising acting Chief Justice Ramesh Ranganathan and Justice U. Durga Prasad Rao, AP A-G D. Srinivas informed the court that the government had decided not to proceed with inviting competitive bids under the Swiss Challenge method in accordance with the notifications issued earlier.
He informed the court that the state brought certain amendments to the APIDE Act, and in view of the amendments, it would issue fresh notifications inviting RFP from interested parties.