Patna, Sept. 23: Good news for contractors with limited resources. The Chief Minister Area Development Scheme (CMADS), which has been introduced after abolishing the legislators’ local area development scheme, has a provision that would allow small contractors to bid for works.

“A new category of contractors, worth not more than Rs 25 lakh, would be given work which would have a cost component of Rs 25 lakh or less under CMADS. Moreover, these contractors should be a resident of the district in which they get themselves registered,” a senior state government official, told The Telegraph on condition of anonymity.

Prior to introduction of this new group, contractors registered with the government used to be divided into three categories.

The first category consisted of contractors with turnover of more than Rs 3.5 crore.

The second category of contractors were those with turnover between Rs 70 lakh and Rs 3.5 crore and the third with turnover of less than Rs 70 lakh.

Citing reason for the step, he said it had been observed in the past that big contractors, after work was awarded to them, generally outsourced it to local petty contractors.

The new system would allow the small players to get work opportunity directly without being dependent on big players.

Around Rs 325 crore would be spent under CMADS in the current fiscal and many of these schemes, which would be executed using this fund, would be worth less than Rs 25 lakh.

“Works like construction of lanes, drains, bus terminus, sheds for passengers, public libraries and others would not require much fund and the small local contractors would get an opportunity to work for such schemes,” said the official.

He said to ensure that complete transparency was maintained while awarding works to contractors, it had also been decided to have e-tendering process in place.

“All the bids under CMADS would be invited electronically and there would be in-built provision of processing the bids so that no one could influence the process of awarding work,” said the official.

Moreover, to ensure that the selection of schemes are done quickly, a concept paper about the scheme was circulated among ministers and it was followed by an interactive session in which the ministers cleared their doubts.

While deciding about schemes, the district-level committees would have to keep in mind that 85 per cent of the fund under this scheme would be meant for rural areas, the remaining would be for development work of urban areas.

“The chief minister has directed the ministers to complete the scheme selection work as soon as possible. This would be followed by making estimates of the schemes on the basis of which bids would be invited,” said the official.