India Ministry of Civil Aviation: Operation, Management and Transfer of Six Airports through PPP
03-Sep-2013 Following the Inter-Ministerial Task Force recommendations for Operation, Management and Development of select airports on Public Private Partnership (PPP) basis, the Request For Qualification (RFQ) for selection of the prospective bidders for Chennai and Lucknow Airports has been invited. The Request for Qualification for these two airports are invited up to mid October, 2013 and Financial Bids are likely to be received by mid December, 2013.
The other four airports namely Kolkata, Guwahati, Jaipur and Ahmedabad are likely to be taken on the same pattern shortly. The scope includes the entire airport including the airside and city side facilities on long term concession.
The application for pre-qualifications are invited from single entity or a group of entities (the consortium coming together to implement the project). The SPV shall be formed for this purpose. In order to secure representation of the Airports Authority of India on the Board of the SPV, the Concession Agreement will include a provision for issue of a golden share in accordance with a Shareholders' Agreement that would form part of the Concession Agreement.
The concessionaire can levy tariffs for aeronautical services including the User Development Fee (UDF) as may be determined by AERA to start with. Such charges would be revised normally once every five years by the Airports Economic Regulatory Authority (AERA) in accordance with the AREA Act. The RFP would indicate the parameters for determining charges for aeronautical services as well as the UDF
Bids will be invited for the project on the basis of the premium in the form of revenue share to the authority for award of the concession. The authority may prescribe a ceiling of revenue share and a bidder who wishes to make an offer above such ceiling shall have the option of giving such bid on the additional parameters as may be specified in the RFP. The concession period shall be pre-determined, and will be indicated in the draft concession agreement. The premium shall constitute the sole criteria for evaluation of bids. The project shall be awarded to the bidder quoting the highest premium.
The selected bidder shall be required to protect the interest of the existing employees of the airports.
No applicant, including its associate, consortium member or an associate will be entitled with the award of more than two airports out of the six airports to be awarded by the authority. Also, applicant, including its associate, shall not be eligible for award of more than one airport from Kolkata, Chennai and Ahmedabad airports.
Regarding the technical capacity and financial capacity due weightage is given to project experience on eligible projects in airport sectors and other core sectors as well as the construction experience of eligible projects of airport sectors. Based on the experiences, score and the criteria specified in RFQ, the applicants shall then be ranked on the basis of their respective aggregate experience scores and short-listed for submission of financial bids. The authority expects to short-list upto seven pre-qualified applicants for participation in the financial bid stage.