Builder loses Games contract

Unhappy with the snail’s pace at which construction of the training venues inside the Games village was progressing, the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) — the Capital’s biggest land development agency — has terminated the contract of Mumbai-based Exportina Payce, reports Moushumi Das Gupta.

The Commonwealth Games village project seems to have hit another roadblock.

HT Image

Unhappy with the snail’s pace at which construction of the training venues inside the Games village was progressing, the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) — the Capital’s biggest land development agency — has terminated the contract of Mumbai-based Exportina Payce.

The company had won a global bid in April 2008 to build the training venues for the Games next year.

Earlier this year, Emaar-MGF, the Dubai based real estate company and project developers for the Commonwealth Games Village, had run into financial trouble and asked DDA for monetary assistance to complete the project.

In May the DDA gave Emaar-MGF Rs 700 crore as part of a bail out deal.

Mumbai’s Exportina Payce was to build four air-conditioned indoor training venues for swimming, athletics, wrestling and weight lifting, for Rs 58 crore.

“The company had completed only 40 per cent of the work. It neither has the money nor the expertise to complete the project,” said a senior DDA official, who did not wish to be named.

Henry Seth, Managing Director of Exportina Payce, could not be contacted despite repeated attempts.

DDA officials, however, maintained that the termination would not in any way affect the completion of the project.

“We have already put two contractors on the job and will be hiring another one shortly. We will complete the project well on time and hand it over to the Commonwealth Games Organizing Committee as per schedule in June 2010,” the official said.

The DDA has also forfeited the company’s security deposit of Rs 5 crore for defaulting.

“The company had already missed three milestones. There was no way they could have met the December 2009 deadline,” the official told HT.

He said the company had delegated work to two subcontractors.

“We got a number of complaints from the sub contractors that they had not been paid for the past several months and their labourers were leaving. We then inspected the site and found the complaints to be true,” the official added.

“We served three show-cause notices to the company but failed to get an appropriate response. We terminated the company’s contract on October 13.”