The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Friday cancelled global tenders for procuring 1 crore Covid-19 vaccines, as all the nine bids received by the BMC failed to meet the stipulated requirements.
“After the expiry of the final deadline to receive global tenders for Covid-19 vaccines, we examined the bids given by the nine vendors. None of the bidders had completed the necessary documentation process. Hence, we rejected the bids, as they failed to fulfil the stipulated requirements of the tender,” Mumbai Municipal Commissioner I S Chahal said.
However, Chahal said that considering the dire need of vaccines, the BMC had decided to purchase Sputnik vaccine on an experimental basis through Dr. Reddy’s Laboratory which distributes the Russian vaccine. “Dr Reddy Laboratories have shown interest in supplying some stocks of Sputnik vaccines to the BMC,” he said.
“The talks with Dr. Reddys Laboratories have been successful. They have agreed to provide us with some stocks of Sputnik V vaccine by June end. Later in July-August, they may augment the supply” Chahal said.
It may be recalled that on May 12, the BMC had floated a global tender to purchase 1 crore vaccines to meet the shortage of vaccines faced by it. Till May 18, the BMC received bids from five suppliers. After the deadline was extended by one more week, the BMC received another three bids.
However, a few bidders did not submit the supporting documents with their bid—an inadequacy prompted the BMC to extend the deadline by one more to a week to submit all the necessary documents and also facilitate other suppliers to submit their bid.