Mumbai: Tainted contractor's kin frontrunner in BMC bid

MUMBAI: Yet again, a tainted contractor's family is the frontrunner for a Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) contract bid.

Corporators in the civic body on Wednesday raised a stink over the BMC planning to give the contract, pertaining to the transportation of a portion of Mumbai's garbage, to Kaviraj MBB, another company of whom has been blacklisted in the desilting scam that rocked the city corporation in June 2015.

The proposal was to transport the garbage of all the areas in Mumbai city area which is brought to the Mahalaxmi refuse transfer centre via mini compactors to the dumping ground.

The BJP corporators in the civic standing committee meeting who flagged the issue said that another company of the contractor Kaviraj MBB to whom the administration plans to the award the contract at a cost of almost Rs 7 crore was already blacklisted in the desilting scam. BJP corporator Prabhakar Shinde said, "This needs to be inquired into as to why the BMC is treating another company of a tainted contractor as their son-in-law almost. There appears to be a high level of corruption in the solid waste management department and a whitepaper on it needs to be brought before the corporators."

Another BJP corporator Makrand Narwekar from Colaba said there was a legal case also ongoing with the contractor previously which needs to be considered. Some of the corporators questioned "what was the need to bring the garbage to Mahalaxmi and why couldn't the same be taken to dumping ground directly?"

The BMC, however, defended itself saying that the two were different companies. "We have already given the contract to M/s Kaviraj MBB Waste Management to transport garbage from the Gorai garbage transfer centre to the three dumping grounds—Deonar, Mulund and Kanjurmarg recently. This was after seeking legal opinion. Therefore, now again as they are the lowest bidder, the contract can be proposed to be given to them again," said an official from BMC solid waste management department.

The standing committee sought more details in the matter and the proposal was put on hold.