MUMBAI: In a major development, the BMC on Friday disqualified all the nine bidders who had responded to the civic body's global tender for procuring vaccines from the open market. The civic body will now procure doses of Russian made Sputnik V from Dr Reddy's laboratories.
After closing the bids on June 1, the civic body began vetting the documents submitted by the nine bidders and identifying the possible suppliers of vaccine doses. During the screening, the civic administration found that none of them qualified due to the lack of complete documentation.
"All the 9 potential suppliers who responded to the global Expression of Interest (EOI) have been disqualified due to lack of proper documentation. Nevertheless, given the importance of undertaking the covid vaccination, the distributor of the Russian vaccine, Sputnik, Dr Reddy's Laboratories on June 4, 2021, expressed their readiness to supply some stock of Sputnik vaccines to the corporation on an experimental basis," said Iqbal Singh Chahal, BMC commissioner.
Additional Municipal Commissioner (Projects) P.Velrasu, on Friday, met the officials from Dr Reddy’s Laboratories. Accordingly, an understanding has been reached and on an experimental basis, some stock of the Sputnik V vaccine will be given to the BMC by the end of June 2021. "Criteria for cold storage of Sputnik vaccine are different. Therefore, after receiving this stock, its cold storage system will be tested,"said a senior BMC official. Following which more number of doses of the Sputnik vaccine will be provided to the Mumbai civic body by July and August 2021, civic officials said.
On May 12, the BMC had floated a global expression of interest (EOI) to procure one crore COVID-19 vaccine doses from the open market. But the entire exercise cme to a naught.
