The Union road transport ministry and the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) have decided to reduce by half the size of road monetisation projects in the next round of bids.
The next round for TOT (toll, operate, transfer) projects would have a handful projects totalling about $500 million, from $1 billion earlier.
“The total project size has been reduced to half but the packages would still be in the range of $200-220 million,” an NHAI official told Business Standard. Essentially, he explained, for faster completion of the tendering process.
Investors, including global pension funds and private equity firms, have shown interest in India’s infrastructure sector. The selection of projects to be bid out in the first round was done while keeping in mind the interest of international investors.
“These investors wanted that the size of a contract should not be less than $200 mn. Lower value projects were deemed financially unviable for these investors,” the official added.