Govt cancels tender for broadband connectivity

New Delhi: State-owned Bharat Broadband Nigam Ltd has cancelled a Rs 19,000-crore tender that was floated for connecting villages across 16 states with an optical fibre-based high-speed broadband network, following the lack of participation of eligible bidders.

The project was approved in June last year to roll out an optical fibre network under BharatNet in 16 states in a public-private partnership model with a total expense of Rs 29,430 crore. The Centre had approved a viability gap fund of Rs 19,041 crore for the project that aimed to connect 3.61 lakh villages across 16 states. The project was divided into nine packages, and tenders for each of the packages were floated separately. For each of the nine tenders, BBNL on February 8 said the tender of the corresponding package "with all its corrigenda is hereby cancelled on account of non-participation by any bidder".

An e-mail query sent to BBNL elicited no response.

However, an official source said that there was participation from some firms; bids were evaluated; but the participants failed to qualify.