MANSEHRA: Abbottabad circuit bench of the Peshawar High Court has ordered re-tendering of Rs100 million contracts for construction of roads, which according to the plaintiff, were awarded without following the due process of fulfilling legal formalities here last month.

Raja Zia, a contractor, had moved the court against award of contracts for construction of roads in Mansehra without fulfilling legal requirements and keeping the entire process secret.

The bench comprising Justice Attique Shah and Justice Arshad Ali after hearing counsel for both the sides declared the entire process of award of contracts annulled and asked the Pakistan Public Works Department chief engineer to re-tender the schemes.

Mr Zia told mediapersons that his counsel had pleaded before the court that chief engineer Pak-PWD, Mansehra, didn’t provide tendering forms to contractors who even approached him for the purpose.

The federal government had transferred Rs100 million funds into the accounts of Pak-PWD for construction of roads in NA-20 and NA-21.

Meanwhile, the PML-N district government awarded contracts of Rs50 million on rates almost 30 per cent below the previous year’s.

The open tendering auction was held at the district council hall here on Wednesday where a team of local government officials led by assistant director Ziaur Rehman supervised the process.

The district government would spend Rs80 million on construction of link roads, pavements, sanitation and water supply schemes and tendering process for the remaining schemes of Rs30 million would be completed next week.

“This is our achievement that we awarded construction contracts to contractors on such competitive rates that we would pay less for works than the previous years,” Mr Rehman claimed.

Published in Dawn, July 20th, 2017