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The Cupboard has accepted a Rs. 566 million tender to produce tyres to the Sri Lanka Transport Board (SLTB) regardless of a technical analysis committee (TEC) discovering that the product bought by the successful bidder had deviated from a large number of mounted, predetermined specs.
The order, equal to the SLTB’s four-month requirement for tyres, has been granted to M/s Ferentino Tyre Company (Pvt) Ltd, in line with official paperwork seen by the Sunday Instances.
The corporate is owned by controversial businessman Nandana Lokuwithana. In 2017, he secured a sweetheart deal from the Yahapalana Authorities to arrange his manufacturing facility, together with an enormous low cost on the lease premium on 100 acres of land in Horana and sweeping tax concessions.
Ferentino’s competitor for the bid, M/s CEAT Kelani Worldwide Tyres (Pvt) Ltd, was rejected as its value package deal was round 15 per cent larger and since it didn’t adjust to two technical necessities to fulfill the SLTB’s expectations. The latter is said to the “minimal load capability” of 1 sort of tyre; and the “minimal anticipated assured mileage” of all 4 tyre sizes.
CEAT subsequently went to the Procurement Appeals Board (PAB) countering that the profitable bidder, Ferentino, had secured the tender based mostly on “untested/unproven mileage” and that this was “completely towards the bid analysis process and good governance practices”. It urged the PAB to reassess the analysis course of.
The PAB, nonetheless, rejected CEAT’s enchantment and upheld the Highways Ministry Secretary’s choice to award the tender to Ferentino. It maintained that, the place CEAT had failed, the chosen bidder supplied a tyre sort that met the SLTB’s necessities on load capability and minimal assured mileage. CEAT had supplied much less assured mileage on all 4 tyre sizes in distinction to Ferentino, it additionally stated.
The Cupboard subsequently accepted Ferentino’s bid. However there at the moment are considerations in transport circles about numerous essential technical specs that the successful bidder had itself departed from–and the chance that this might influence negatively on public security.
As an illustration, the three-member TEC has discovered the Ferentino’s tyre of dimension 7.50 x 16 deviated from the required general diameters ordered by SLTB.
In samples offered by Ferentino, the “load capability double” of this tyre additionally fell under the burden required by SLTB. (“Load capability double” refers to how a lot weight one tyre is rated to hold when paired with one other).
The groove depths of those tyres had been a number of millimetres decrease than the SLTB specs. Extra critically, in a single out of the three Ferentino tyre samples that engineering workers inspected, the tyre quantity–which is indicative of the date of manufacture and have to be stamped on the date the product is made–was “unclear”.
“We, due to this fact, advocate that the inventory of seven.50 x 16 tyres don’t conform to the Sri Lanka Transport Board specs as per the samples we’ve examined,” the TEC holds.
In tyre dimension 8.25 x 20, the SLTB ordered an outer diameter of the tyres to be 988mm. The three inspected samples had outer diameters of 970, 962 and 968mm every, the TEC observes, including that this inventory of tyres additionally didn’t conform to SLTB necessities.
The tyre dimension 9.00 x 20 had a extra major problem, the TEC holds, indicating that the manufacturing date had been tampered with.
“Whereas the tyre numbers of those tyres are very clearly marked, it’s clear that after the manufacturing of the tyre, rubber has been utilized on the spot and the quantity marked on high of it,” its report says. “The tyre quantity needs to be recorded in the course of the manufacturing course of. The manufacturing yr and week of manufacturing of a tyre could be identified by this quantity. If the quantity is printed later, there’s a downside in figuring out the age of the tyre.” This inventory can also be deemed by the TEC to be outdoors of SLTB specs.
In tyre dimension 1000 x 20, the tyre numbers of two out of three samples had been unclear and the outer diameters in addition to depth of the tyre treads had been decrease than ordered. The inventory is held to have deviated from SLTB necessities.
Regardless of these points, SLTB Chairman S.M.D.L.Okay.D. Alwis in July defended the tender award to Ferentino and revealed that the corporate had already began supplying the tyres. He admits in a letter seen by the Sunday Instances that engineers who inspected the merchandise had highlighted the shortcomings.
“However contemplating the present tyre disaster in SLTB and the necessity to speedily put 175 buses on the highway beneath the challenge of rehabilitating 400 buses, I give approval to just accept 1,032 tyres whereas notifying the related firm to right the minor defects within the parameters indicated by the technical experiences and to re-manufacture the tyres,” he states.
(sundaytimes.lk)
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