L&T Gains On Winning Largest Contract For Bullet Train Project

On Tuesday, shares of Larsen and Toubro (L&T) rose almost 2 percent to Rs 922 on NSE in the morning trade after it emerged as the lowest bidder for designing and constructing the largest length of the high-speed rail line between Mumbai and Ahmedabad.

L&T emerged as the lowest bidder, beating two other bids led by Tata Projects and Afcons Infrastructure after the National High-Speed Rail Corp. (NHSRCL) opened financial bids for package C4 on Monday. The C4 package is the largest stretch of construction for the mainline, representing 47 percent of the 508.17 km line.

"Financial bids for the design and construction of 237 km length of viaduct for 508 km of Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail corridor were opened today and Larsen & Toubro Ltd is the lowest bidder," a release from NHSRCL said.

According to a PTI report citing sources, L&T's contract is worth Rs 24,985 crore.

The tender covers about 47 percent of total alignment of 508 km, between Vapi (Zaroli Village at Maharashtra- Gujarat Border) and Vadodara in Gujarat. This includes four stations namely Vapi, Billimora, Surat and Bharuch, and Surat Depot, it said.

The NDA government's ambitious project of the Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train corridor is being built at a cost of Rs 1.08 trillion with funding from the Japan International Cooperation Agency.

The NHSRCL had invited bids for the High-Speed Rail on 15 March 2019. Technical bids were opened on 23 September, after a delay due to COVID-19, in which three bidders qualified. The other bidders for the construction project included a consortium comprising Tata Projects Ltd, J Kumar Infraprojects Ltd and NCC Ltd, and another consisting of Afcons Infrastructure Ltd, Ircon International Ltd and JMC Projects India Ltd.