RAHIL AHMED KHAN Vs. STATE OF CHHATTISGARH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present writ petition is filed against rejection of the bid submitted by the petitioner in pursuance of the Notice Inviting Tender (NIT) dated 22-08-2019 by the respondents for extraction of mining mineral sand.

(2.) The relevant facts of the case are that, respondent No. 4 issued Notice Inviting Tender (NIT) on 22-08-2019 in terms of,2019 [(Chhattisgarh Mining Mineral Ordinary Sand (Quarrying and Trade) Rules, 2019]. As per the requirements of the tender conditions, two envelops are required to be submitted, one for the technical bid and another for financial bid. The petitioner along with other participants submitted their bids and after evaluation of the bid submitted by the tenderers, the technical bid submitted by the petitioner along with few others has been considered to be non-responsive and he has been declared as ineligible to participate in the auction/tender proceedings. This made the petitioner to approach this Court by filing this writ petition with the following reliefs:-

(3.) Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that, though in the tender document, there is a clause 7 showing the required documents to be submitted, including the Income Tax Return of last 3 years at clause 7.6 and affidavit declaring that no criminal case is registered against the tenderer at clause 7.7, but in the guidelines dated 27-08-2019 issued by respondent No. 3 -Director, Geology and Mining department, Chhattisgarh, other required documents have been mentioned but submission of last three years' Income Tax Return as well as the affidavit mentioning that no criminal case is registered against the bidder is not forming part of guidelines. He submits that as the guidelines issued by the 3rd respondent is of subsequent date and is with respect to the procedure to be adopted on receiving the bids, Auction(reverse auction) proceeding initiated by the Collector of the State. Even though, the petitioner is assessed to Income Tax and he is submitting his Income Tax Return since many years but due to the fact that the guidelines are not bearing said clause, he could not able to submit those Income Tax Return of last three years and also the affidavit of having no criminal antededant. He also submits that in view of the guidelines issued by the 3rd respondent, the rejection of the technical bid, so far as, relates to the petitioner to be set aside and appropriate direction to be issued to the respondents to consider the price bid of the petitioner also. The learned counsel submitted that the terms and conditions of the tender document as mentioned in Clause 7.6 and 7.7 are unconstitutional and participants have a right of level playing field. He also submits that the petitioner fulfills both the conditions i.e. 7.6 and 7.7 but as it has not been mentioned in the guidelines issued by the 3rd respondent, same has not been submitted and it is for respondent No. 5 to have taken into consideration the guidelines issued by the 3rd respondent. He also submits that the petitioner has also not submitted the affidavit declaring that there are no criminal antecedents against him but the rejection is only on account of non-submission of Income Tax Return of last three years', which clearly shows lack of proper scrutiny of the documents and therefore submits that proceeding of the tender is required to be interdicted.