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Awarding Contract for Printing MRPs
By KTM Metro Reporter
July 6, 2010: the government has awarded the contract for printing MRPs to the French company Oberthur Technologies at US $ 3.59 per piece today according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Nepal. Other three companies such as British De La Rue, Indonesian Perum Peruru and Singaporean Three M Technology have also bided for the job of printing MRPs.
According to some news reports, British company De La Rue and Indonesian company Perum Peruri have complained to the Nepalese Foreign Ministry for the French company not meeting the requirements mentioned in the bid documents.
The Madhav government had cancelled the international bid for printing machine-readable passports (MRP) in January 2010 just to award the printing of four million copies of MRPs to the Indian state-run company at US $ 4 per piece in March. However, the government cancelled the contract given to the Indian company under the political pressure from the opposition political parties causing embarrassment to Indian and Nepalese governments.
Following the deadline set by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the Nepalese government needed to issue MRPs starting on April 01, 2010 but the government has secured three-month extension of this period, and has continued to issue the conventional passports.
