Cabinet has approveed turnaround and restructuring plans of Air India. This information was given by Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh after a cabinet meeting. It also approved a bill that seeks to regulate government purchases of above 50 lakh rupees through a Transparent bidding process. The Cabinet meeting, chaired by Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh, approved the public procurement bill that has a provision to debar bidders found engaged in corrupt practices. Speaking to reporters Information and Broadcasting minsiter Ambika Soni said that there is no overarching legislation governing public procurement by the central government and central public sector enterprises.
The bill provides for a jail term ranging from six months to five years for public servants found guilty of demanding and accepting bribes from bidders of government contracts. The GoM headed by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee had sent the bill for the approval of the Union Cabinet. The cabinet also gave its node to state owned Neyveli Lignite Corporation's proposed joint venture to set up a ten thousand crore rupees Thermal power project in Uttar Pradesh. The UP government has already given in principle approval to allocate 2500 acres of land and 80 cusecs of water for the project.