The Nagoya District Court on Friday ordered a public corporation and three leading appliance makers to pay around 100 million yen to Aichi Prefecture and the city of Nagoya in a civil suit over a bid-rigging case concerning water and sewage construction projects in the early 1990s.

The court ordered Hitachi Ltd. and Fuji Electric Co. to return about 48 million yen to the prefectural government. Mitsubishi Electric Corp. and the Japan Sewage Works Agency, a public corporation affiliated with the national government, were ordered to return about 57 million yen to the city government.

It is the first time a court has acknowledged illegal conduct by a local government in a civil suit related to bid-rigging cases in water and sewage construction projects.

Presiding Judge Yukio Kato pointed out that it is illegal for prefectural and city governments to fail to exercise the right of compensation for damages.