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Work on Sewri-Nhava link likely to begin by year-end

An advertisement calling for pre-qualification of bidders will be out on Wednesday. The 22km-long sea link will connect Sewri with Nhava in Navi Mumbai.

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By this year-end, construction to bridge Sewri with Nhava through a 22km-long link is likely to commence. The final nod from Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA) to finance Mumbai Trans Harbour Link (MTHL) project is in and tendering process has been commenced by the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA).

"This time MTHL is bound to come, though there have been several attempts in the past. Yesterday (Monday), JICA gave approval to the project and today (Tuesday) we have started bidding process," said UPS Madan, metropolitan commissioner of MMRDA.

An advertisement calling for pre-qualification of bidders will be out on Wednesday. The 22km-long sea link will connect Sewri with Nhava in Navi Mumbai.

"JICA has approved the revised cost of MTHL project," informed Madan. The earlier estimated price was Rs11,000 crore, which has ballooned to Rs17,750 crore. Of this, JICA will finance 80 per cent of the project cost at low interest rates. The balance will be sourced through MMRDA and the state government.

MMRDA officials mentioned that the time-frame to complete the project remains same as 2019 and construction work is scheduled to start in another 5-6 months.

The Request for Qualification (RFQ) will commence followed by shortlisted bidders being asked to submit their proposals (request for proposal) after a couple of months. Thereafter, the proposals will be subject to technical scrutiny and only then the financial bids will be opened. This entire process will take six months to finally award work orders for the three packages to implement the project.

As per the MMRDA's plan, the bridge will have a total of six lanes, three in either direction. Of the total 22km, 16.5km will be bridge component and the balance would be on coast at Sewri and Nhava. Earlier, there were plans to have a metro line for public transport on MTHL, but it has been shelved off by MMRDA officials as 'it will require constructing an additional bridge parallel to MTHL'.

The previous attempt by MMRDA to construct MTHL was made in November 2011 and in August 2013, but on the D-Day for submission of bids none of the shortlisted private firms turned up to bid for the project.

When the project was first put through the bidding process by the state in 2005, the estimated price was Rs4,000 crore.

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