NEW DELHI, Dec 23: The Larsen&Toubro-Asea Brown Boveri consortium has withdrawn its bid for the 800 MW, $700 million Koldam hydro electric power project in Himachal Pradesh, leaving Reliance-Bechtel and Daewoo-Punjab State Electricity Board (PSEB) combines in the fray.

Highly placed official sources told The Financial Express that the L&T-ABB combine conveyed its decision to opt out of the race for the project to the Himachal Pradesh State Electricity Board (HPSEB) at the pre-qualification meeting held recently. Earlier four bidders - Videocon-Philip Holzman-Siemens combine, L&T-ABB combine, Reliance-Bechtel combine and Daewoo-PSEB combine - were pre-qualified for the project by HPSEB. A year later, the final list has narrowed down to two.

Videocon-Philip Holzman, which was also one of the strong contenders, has already withdrawn from the project. With this, the race for bagging this project has narrowed down to Reliance and Daewoo. Sources said the date for request for qualification (RFQ) documents has also been brought forward by the government from February 28, 1998 to January 31, 1998.

They said the cost of this project has also escalated to almost double and the provisional cost estimates of $700 million given initially, when the project was thrown open for private sector participation are based on the March 1995 figures. The project report for this proposal has been prepared by Crippen International Consultants, Canada, sources said. Under the present terms and conditions, of the total electricity produced from the project, 22 per cent will be sold to HPSEB and 66 per cent will be allowed to be sold directly to consumers. The remaining 12 per cent will go to the state government free of cost, as per the project conditions, officials said.

According to HPSEB officials, the techno-economic clearance was awarded to the 800 MW Koldam Project in Bilaspur district of Himachal Pradesh, by the Central Electricity Authority (CEA) way back in 1988 and it was given the environment clearance in June, 1990, following which the government of Himachal Pradesh proposed implementation of the project by the private sector. Although the exact reasons for the two companies to withdraw their bids for the Koldam project is not known, sources say that this was owing to the high risk involved in the project.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.