KATHMANDU, AUG 06 -
The Supreme Court on Friday instructed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) not to halt any process related to the Machine Readable Passport (MRP).

The decision has paved the way for the government to sign a deal with France-based Oberthur Technologies that bagged the multi-million passport contract.

A bench of Justices Khil Raj Regmi and Krishna Prasad Upadhyay passed the verdict. Two advocates had registered a case in the apex court challenging the MoFA decision to award the bid to Oberthur. The decision also landed in the Parliamentary Accounts Committee, which, without taking a final call, has instructed the ministry not to halt the procurement process.

“We will sign the deal very soon,” Foreign Secretary Madan Kumar Bhattarai said. MoFA officials were waiting for the court’s ruling in the case. “We have prepared all the related documents. The deal is likely to be signed on Sunday,” another MoFA official said, adding no specified feature would be compromised in the deal.

On June 6, MoFA decided to award the project to Oberthur, whose officials are in town for the deal.

The French firm has deposited five percent of the total project cost under performance bond as bank guarantee, a pre-requisite to signing the deal.



 

Posted on: 2010-08-07 06:47

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