Gurgaon: Even as MCG faces allegations that contractors failed to deploy the promised fleet under six-month door-to-door waste collection contracts, internal documents accessed by TOI show the civic body awarded these contracts at rates 30% to 53% below its own cost estimates, raising questions about the bids’ financial viability and whether aggressive under-quoting contributed to the poor service delivery.MCG had estimated the cost of the eight zone-wise contracts at Rs 22.5 crore but awarded them for a combined Rs 13.4 crore, an overall discount of about 40%. Individual bids ranged from 30.4% to 53.2% below the corporation’s estimates, with no successful bidder coming close to the projected cost.The sharpest cut came in zone 5, where the private agency secured the contract by quoting Rs 1.5 crore against an estimated Rs 2.9 crore — a reduction of 53.2%. In zone 2, another agency won at 48.4% below estimate, quoting Rs 2.4 crore against Rs 4.8 crore. The remaining six contracts were awarded at discounts ranging from 30.4% to 38.2%.The disclosures come days after MCG’s six-month stop-gap arrangement was hit by controversy over the alleged non-deployment of vehicles. The contracts require agencies to deploy 591 vehicles for door-to-door collection across the eight zones, but an MCG assessment found only 369 on the ground. Councillors who took part in subsequent inspections alleged the actual number of operational vehicles was even lower, accusing contractors of arranging borrowed vehicles to inflate attendance during checks.“We got only these bidders for the short-term contract. Our primary focus is to start the five-year contract for door-to-door waste collection. As soon as the long-term contract is finalised, it will replace the short-term contracts,” said MCG additional commissioner Ravinder Yadav.The city has relied on temporary sanitation contracts since June 2024, after the termination of Ecogreen Energy’s agreement. The civic body is simultaneously trying to finalise a long-term, Rs 647-crore waste collection project, after an earlier proposal was rejected by Haryana govt’s high-powered purchase committee over quoted rates.Councillors, who have already demanded an independent probe into the alleged vehicle shortage, are now expected to question whether MCG prioritised the lowest financial bids without adequately assessing whether agencies could realistically execute the work at such steep discounts.Ward 11 councillor Kuldeep Yadav said awarding contracts below estimated cost is a practice that “inevitably breeds corruption.”“How can a contractor sustain services under such conditions? For instance, if the actual cost of hiring or purchasing a vehicle is Rs 50,000 but a contractor bids Rs 25,000 to secure the contract, the shortfall has to be recovered somehow. That creates incentives to compromise quality or resort to corrupt practices to avoid losses. To ensure fair competition and maintain quality, bids should not be allowed to go more than 10% below the estimated cost,” Yadav said.
