RNEL urges Def Min to put contracts on fast track

| | Mumbai

Reliance Naval Engineering Ltd (RNEL) has appealed to Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman “to urgently review, streamline and fast-track all defence contracts to eliminate delays of years”.

In a letter to the Minister, the company has listed a series of major defence contracts which are pending processing and award for several years, which is adversely affecting the two major private sector shipyards in India.

It has detailed 13 Requests for Information (RFIs)— 10 for Indian Navy and three for Indian Coast Guard — which were issued way back in December 2014 for projects worth Rs 50,000 crore, to which RNEL, defence public sector undertakings (DPSUs) and other private sector shipyards responded promptly.

Of these 13 RFIs, “not even one” has been processed so far — though over three-and-a-half-years have elapsed — to the final competitive bidding stage under the Defence Production Policy (DPP) 2018, it rued.