Staff Correspondent
The Cabinet Purchase Committee on Wednesday approved five proposals including the offer of Oberthur Technologies, a French company, for production and distribution of 9 crore Smart National Identity Cards (Smart NIDs) under an Election Commission project.
A meeting of the Cabinet body, chaired by Finance Minister AMA Muhith, gave nod to the proposals.
After the meeting Mutafijur Rahman, Join secretary of Cabinet Division, told reporters, "The Tk 70.65 crore Bhairab River Re-excavation Project in Meherpur has been approved. Dockyard and Engineering Works Ltd, a company run by Bangladesh Navy, will implement the project."
On the Smart NID project, funded by World Bank's International Development Association (IDA), he said the Cabinet body's proceedings will be sent to the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) for approval. "Once it's approved by the PMO, the Election Commission will sign a deal with Oberthur Technologies to start its job."
 The Cabinet body also approved the Water Resource Ministry's proposal for appointing a project management and design consultant for Muhiri Irrigation Project.
The Asian Development Bank will fund the project.
 Power Division's proposal for procuring consultancy services for Barapukuria 275 MW coal-fired thermal power plant (3rd unit) also got the Cabinet body's green signal.
Steag Energy Services, India won the consultancy job along with its associates Steag Energy, Essen, Germany and BCL Bangladesh. The cost has been estimated to be  Tk 27.88 crore for this consultancy scheme.
The Railway Ministry's proposal for raising the cost to implement Laksam-Chinki Astana Double Line project also received the go-ahead. The ministry proposed increasing the contractor's contract value by 23.55 per cent.  Now the project cost will go up by Tk 306.43 crore to Tk 1607.65 crore from the existing Tk 1301.21 crore.