Should be given chance to compete in NTPC deal: Gammon

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Should be given chance to compete in NTPC deal: Gammon

In an interview with CNBC-TV18, Rohit Modi, deputy MD of Gammon India said there should be fair competition in the NTPC deal and the company should be given a chance to participate in it.

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The Delhi High Court ruled against NTPC 's decision to disqualify Gammon's subsidiary, Ansaldo Caldaie India from participating in the tender for an equipment supply contract. It said, based on the tender documents, NTPC could not exclude Ansaldo from the tendering process.

In an interview with CNBC-TV18, Rohit Modi, deputy MD of Gammon India said there should be fair competition and the company should be given a chance to participate in the NTPC deal.

"If you look at the tender conditions, BHEL will get either five or six, it is the other party, which will get five or six depending on whether they are L1 or L2," he added.

Below is the verbatim transcript of Modi's interview with Udayan Mukherjee and Mitali Mukherjee of CNBC-TV18. Also watch the accompanying video.

Q: Can you clarify the situation and where it stands with NTPC's supercritical tender and what's happening with your bid along with Ansaldo?

A: Earlier NTPC had not shortlisted us and they decided to disqualify us against which we had gone to the high court. Now the high court has upheld our case. The government policy wanted to encourage the supercritical boilers to come in into the power sector space and they wanted Indian manufacturers to take over and to encourage it.

We in fact are the only company who went out, bought a controlling stake in an international major, Ansaldo and we bid with them. Unfortunately, NTPC at that point of time thought that we were not eligible.

Now the high court has upheld the case very clearly. I don't know what NTPC is going to do thereafter. Are they going to honour the high court judgment or are they going to appeal against it? It's very clearly about encouraging competition, encouraging manufacturing of supercritical boilers in India. At one level it is also about Indian companies owning these technologies and not just having to rely upon multinationals to provide these technologies.

Q: I believe though that they planned to appeal to the Supreme Court so then this still remains hanging by fire, right?

A: In the high court, they actually wanted to dismiss our case on the ground that it will consume a lot of time. Now if they still want to appeal this in a high court it is clearly their choice and all of us have to depend and go through the process of law.

All we are saying is let there be fair competition. Let the government policies be upheld and let the technologies be transfer to India. It is from a nationalist point of view I look at it, as an Indian I feel concerned about it. As Gammon its fine, we have been there for 90 years, we win some, and we lose some.

Q: It seems like a hostile situation already you are in two courts with this deal, do you think you have a realistic chance of winning this ahead of BHEL, L&T etc but from NTPC?

A: All we are saying is allowing us to participate in the deal. We are not saying who is going to lose or who is going to win. If you look at the tender conditions, BHEL will get either five or six , it is the other party, which will get five or six depending on whether they are L1 or L2.

In the first round NTPC had disqualified everybody, today they have actually said okay, L&T , Mitsubishi, Hitachi, BHR and BGR  are qualified. If you look at Ansaldo, we have supplied the supercritical boilers around the world. In the last one year we have commissioned three supercritical boilers of 660 megawatts each.

We have done it to a large multinational company, which is amongst the largest utilities in the world. We have supplied to NTPC itself and still, if they don't even want to give us a chance, then they are restricting competition. They are discouraging manufacturing of international technologies owned by Indian companies.