The Hindu Business Line : Public-private partnerships

A lot is being said and written about the comparatively new experiment of public-private partnerships and the efforts of governments, corporates, banks and financial organisations in acquiring expert project appraisal skills.

Are steps being initiated to achieve this objective?

One noticed in a recent advertisement in The Economist inviting global expression of interest cum request for qualification of the Mass Rapid Transport system in Hyderabad a clause stating that "certain incentives and or concessions may be extended to the developers by Government of Andhra Pradesh for enhancing the viability of the projects and that GoAP may consider facilitating from Government of India viability gap funding on best effort basis."

Was it necessary to provide such allurements to attract interest?

Invariably researchers have found that mega projects involve cost overruns and delays causing loss to the government and its budgets and to the overall economy even while the reasons for the cost-over runs have been contributed by the project providers and their contractors.

No wonder such hassles arise because of loose clauses such as the one given above.

S. Subramanyan

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