SATISH N Vs. STATE OF KARNATAKA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner is before this Court seeking issue of mandamus to direct respondent No.3 to accept the bid of the petitioner as having been duly submitted on line and to consider the same in accordance with the terms and conditions of the tender.

(2.) The respondent No.3 issued the Request For Proposal (RFP) on 20.07.2016 for design, manufacture, supply and commission of AC bus as per the specifications indicated therein. The submission of bids was to be made online through the Karnataka Government e-procurement portal. The last date which was fixed therein was extended up to 25.08.2016 and the bids were to be uploaded on the said date before 5.30 p.m. (17:30 hrs). The petitioner and the respondents No.5 and 6 are stated to have responded to the same. The case of the petitioner is that the petitioner having prior experience in participating in similar bids had maintained the appropriate system settings and the software to ensure the compatibility to submit its bid online through e-portal. The petitioner claims to have kept its digital signature and the scanned copies of the bid documents for the said purpose.

(3.) Accordingly, on the last date for submission of bids the petitioner started the process of submitting the technical and financial bids at 4.30 p.m. On uploading, the system prompted for encryption of the documents by using the digital signature and the petitioner encrypted the documents by using the digital signature. At that stage, the system prompted the petitioner 'sign and encryption'. As such the same was complied after which the petitioner was directed to the main page to key-in certain date manually under the heading 'Item wise bid financial offer'. The further process was also carried on as prompted from the system and when the 'sign and encryption' was attempted using the digital signature, a message 'unexpected error' was displayed. Though the draft had been uploaded the process was not completed due to the indication of such error. Hence the petitioner contacted the customer care of respondent No.4 for help but the assistance provided was not of any help despite the petitioner clarifying the position and indicating the error and seeking for a solution to complete the process. The petitioner accordingly contacted the respondent No.4 on the next day by stating with regard to the problem encountered and also submitted the hard copies by dropping it in the box kept for the said purpose as it is also a requirement under the RFP. A further request was also made on 27.08.2016 and again up to 31.08.2016. However since the respondents No.3 and 4 did not accede to the request of the petitioner, the petitioner has approached this Court.