INTEGRATED DATABASES INDIA LIMITED Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India the petitioner seeks a writ for quashing of a condition in tender notice whereby the tenderer is required to have experience of printing, binding and supplying telephone directories to local telephone system of atleast 50,000 lines (Department of Telecommunications, Ministry of Communications, Government of India). The facts, in so far as they are relevant for the purposes of this petition are as under :

(2.) The second respondent. General Manager, Hyderabad Telecommunications, invited tenders on behalf of the President of India from competent agencies to "convert and compile the given directory data in the magnetic media and/or manuscri into directory format, print and bind the same by procuring the required paper, all works at the cost of the tenderer, and supply the telephone directories free of cost for the five consecutive issues, starting the first issue distribution during second week of June 1996." The Notice Inviting Tender (NIT) also called upon the prospective tenderers to indicate the royalty amount which would be payable to the General Manager, Hyderabad Telecommunications, for each issue and share the percentage of white page revenue with it. The NIT further provided that the successful tenderer will be permitted to procure his own classified advertisements and cover page advertisements. It further laid down the qualification for prospective tenderers as under:

(3.) It also, inter alia, provided that the submission of tender shall be taken as acceptance of all terms and conditions of the tender documents. According to the NIT, the General Manager, Hyderabad Telecom District, reserved the right to reject any tender or tenders without assigning any reason including the one with highest bid.