The month of January 2011 witnessed only 48 contracts being awarded. The lowest figures both in terms of number of contracts awarded as well as worth of jobs involved when compared with the preceding four months (September - December 2010) statistics.

India based business houses bagged contracts worth Rs 14,603.38 crore, almost half the amount in comparison to December 2010. In December, a total of 72 contracts were amassed worth a sum of Rs 27,822 crore.

The third quarter (October - December 2010) had seen record rise followed by sharp fall and then recovery in contract finalisation activities. While, October 2010 saw record 90 contracts worth Rs 72,243 crore being firmed up, November saw the aggregate contract value dipping to Rs 14,947 crore. Contract awarding activities staged a recovery in December with 71 contracts worth Rs 27,822 crore being handed over by project promoters to Indian companies. The momentum seems to have lost once again in January 2011.

Of the 48 contracts awarded in January, eight were awarded by foreign conglomerates. KEC International was given a Rs 942-crore contract by Kazakhstan Electricity Grid Operating Company for the execution, including rehabilitation, of a total of 21 substations spread across the North East and South of Kazakhstan.

Punj Lloyd bagged two orders from Occidental Mukhaizna and Pertamina respectively. The Rs 323- crore contract from Occidental was for engineering, procurement and construction of a new water treatment plant at oil production fields in Oman. The Pertamina contract valued at Rs 271 crore was for engineering, procurement, construction, installation and commissioning of three well head platforms and laying three segments of 18.6 km of offshore gas pipeline along with subsea 'wye' installation in existing pipeline without any shut down in Indonesia.

The Power Sector managed to maintain its premier position in the month with 18 contracts worth Rs 8959.31 crore in its kitty. Suzlon Energy won the largest order from the Caparo Group. The contract valued at Rs 5,760 crore was for utilising Suzlon turbine models including the S88 and the new S9X series 2.1 MW turbines with the doubly-fed induction generator technology for 1,000 MW of wind power projects.

Next in tow was PGCIL's Rs 1,600 crore contract awarded by the Jharkhand State Electricity Board. The scope of work consisted of setting up 1,000 km of transmission lines and 10 sub-stations in Jharkhand. The Roadways and Railways sectors were the other sectors that clinched maximum contracts. A total of seven projects worth Rs 2133.06 crore were bagged in Roadways while six contracts valued at Rs 1657.19 were amassed in the Railways sector.

The NHAI awarded a Rs 1150-crore contract to Supreme Infrastructure India for upgradation of a 84-km stretch of the Panvel-Indapur stretch of NH-17 in Maharashtra. A consortium of L&T, Alstom Transport and Alstom India bagged a contract from Chennai Metro Rail. The Rs 449.22-crore contract was for design and construction of track work in viaduct, tunnel, underground and depot for corridors I & II including 104 route km & 15 route km of track work in the depot at Koyambedu.

Among the other contracts closed in January, a Rs 500-crore one bagged by Synergy Property Development Services from Huawei Technologies and a Rs 450 crore job work bagged by Arabian Construction Company WLL and Simplex Infrastructures for civil construction of Lodha's proposed residential building in Mumbai were noteworthy.