Patna, Nov. 8: Chief minister Nitish Kumar’s claim to improve the standard of higher education in the state has received a setback and that too on his home turf, Nalanda.

Infrastructure Development Authority (IDA), Bihar, has cancelled the contract for infrastructure development at Nalanda College of Engineering, Chandi, given to M/s IVRCL Infrastructure Private Limited. The IDA took the decision after the contractors failed to meet the deadline of the first phase of the project and did not care to reply despite 14 missives by the authority.

The Nalanda College of Engineering in affiliated to Aryabhatt Knowledge University (AKU), the dream project of the chief minister.

IDA has now initiated the re-tendering process and imposed hefty penalty on the contractor. It has also confiscated the security deposit for the project.

“IDA has cancelled the agreement with M/s IVRCL Infrastructure Private Limited for non-compliance with the terms of the contract for infrastructure development at Nalanda College of Engineering, Chandi. In doing so, their security deposit, 2 per cent of the contract value, has also been confiscated, which is in addition to the two penalties earlier imposed on the contractor. Moreover, IDA has already issued fresh tenders to complete this project,” said a senior officer of IDA, preferring anonymity.

IDA and IVRCL had entered into an agreement for the Rs 31.66-crore project on October 26 last year with a deadline of June 19, 2012.

However, because of non-compliance of clauses for completion of the work, the agreement was cancelled (as per Clause 14 of the agreement) with a letter, dated September 5, 2011, from Ajay Kumar, chief consultant (technical), IDA. Till that date, none of the structures had been completed even up to the plinth level. Moreover, a total of Rs 86.11 lakh was released for this work to IVRCL during the course of the contract. Meanwhile, the administrators of Nalanda college, are agitated about the poor condition of the institute.

“The condition of the college is poor, as classes are held under trees at times. Only 30 per cent of the faculty are sanctioned teachers and in the absence of a full-time principal, there is an acting principal at Chandi at present. The situation is the same at engineering colleges in Motihari, Muzzafarpur and Bhagalpur among others,” said S.N. Guha, the vice-chancellor of AKU.