Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad has urged contractors from India and China to lower their bids for a multibillion-dollar railway project in Malaysia, newspapers said today.

Mahathir said the double tracking railway project, part of an ambitious trans-Asia link from Singapore to China, remained open to them if they would accept a more reasonable value, the New Sunday Times reported.

"Their initial quotation was RM42 billion (US$11 billion). When we said it was too high, they reduced it to RM24 billion," the paper quoted the premier as saying.

Mahathir said the willingness to reduce the contract value by 43 percent was an indication they had overpriced it.