Larsen & Toubro Ltd, India's top construction and engineering firm, plans to bid for building a new airport in Muscat, the Hindustan Times newspaper said on Monday, citing an unnamed company official.

"The government of Oman is in the process of inviting bids. We will be submitting bids," the paper quoted the official as saying. The contract could be worth up to 30 billion rupees ($711 million), it said.

A L&T spokesman could not be immediately reached for comment.

"We will look for foreign airport modernisation contracts and greenfield airports, as and when they come up," the paper quoted K.V. Rangaswamy, president of L&T's construction division, as saying.

Muscat's current international airport can handle 4.2 million passengers, while the new one planned 15 kms away would have a capacity for 12 million passengers that would eventually go up to 48 million, the newspaper said.

L&T, which has built two new airports in India, is also involved in modernising the Delhi and Mumbai airports.