Three companies submit financial bids amid rancour -E-DRIVING LICENCE PROJECT

THE financial bids for the electronic driving licence project were closed on Wednesday amid high drama. Three competing firms were engaged in a heated argument at the office of Department of Transport Management, Koteshower after one of them tried to submit the bid without following the due process. The drama unfolded when Madras Security Printers, one of the bidding firms, tried to submit its bid without mentioning its name in the envelop at around 12:30 pm, leaving the department officials and bidder tense for a while. Three firms—Madras Security Printers, Indra Sistemas SA of Spain and IRIS Corporation Berhad of Malaysia—are competing for the project that aims to issue electronic driving licence and blue book. Representatives of Indra Sistemas SA of Spain and IRIS Corporation Berhad of Malaysia and Transport Department officials had heated argument with the representatives of the Indian firm Madras Security regarding the later’s “irresponsible” act. However, the department later accepted the bid of Madras Security. “The Indian company later fulfilled the formality and its bid was accepted after advice of the Asian Development Bank (ADB),” said an official at the Transport Department. The electronic driving licence is the project that has received $ 2.3 million assistance from the ADB under the ICT Development Project. It targets to implement smart card technology based e-driving licence and blue book for vehicles in the country. According to department sources, Malaysian IRIS Corporation has tabled the lowest bid at $ 1.16 million with Madras Security coming second with $ 1.5 million. Spanish Indra Sistemas’ bid is the highest at $ 2.1 million. “We opened the financial proposals of all three companies. It will take around a week to complete their evaluation,” said Devi Ram Bhandari, spokesperson for the Transport Department. He added that the Madras Security’s bid was accepted as it was one of the short-listed firms to have made it through the technical evaluation of proposals. Under the set rules, the evaluation of the price bid will be done following Quality and Cost Based Selection (QCBS). The bidder posting the highest score under the QCBS system will be awarded the contract. E-DRIVING LICENCE PROJECT