New Delhi: Did GMR Infrastructure get a sweet deal from the ousted Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed, which eventually turned sour after a new government under president Mohammed Waheed came to power?
If Hassan Saeed, special adviser to the new Maldives president is to be believed the termination of the Indian major’s contract to manage Male Airport last week, was justified as the project turned into an unviable proposition for the Government.
That is because Saeed has projected that instead of earning revenue, for giving GMR the concession to run the airport, it had to ironically fork out a staggering eight billion Maldivian Rufiyaa or Rs 2871 crore over the 25 year tenure of the concession to GMR, seriously impacting the coffers of the tiny island.
The reason for this was a bonanza given by the previous government. After a civil court cancelled imposition of a US $ 25 airport development charge (ADC) and US $ 2 as insurance charge from all departing international passengers in December last, Nasheed just before he was ousted in February, permitted GMR to set off the short fall amount (for the reason of non-collection of ADC charge) against the payment of future variable annual concession fee.
02/12/12 Surajeet Das Gupta & N Sundaresha Subramanian/Business Standard
