CHANDRA SRINIVASAN Vs. D M SUKHTANKAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a joint petition filed by one social worker in Municipal Ward No. 48 (Petitioner No. 1) a Municipal Councilor in Word No. 104 (Petitioner No. 2), the District President of the Janata Party, North Central Bombay (Petitioner No. 2) and the Secretary of the Samajwadi Mahila Sabha of Maharashtra State (Petitioner No. 4) and it is substantially directed at the action of the Municipal Commissioner (Respondent No. 1) in accepting the tender given by Respondent No. 2 M/s. Degremont international, on the footing that the Standing Committee of the Municipal Corporation of Greater Bombay must be deemed to have approved the Commissioner's proposal made to the Standing Committee recommending that the tender of M/s. Degremont international (hereinafter refereed to as "Respondent No. 2") should be accepted.

(2.) The facts which have given rise to this petition are not in dispute, Sealed tenders for the supply, delivery, erection and commissioning of the water supply plant at Panjrapur were invited by the Consultants of the Municipal Corporation, The works included the following:

(3.) The tenders of the seven firms were scrutinized and evaluated by M/s. Tata Consulting Engineers in association with M/s. Binnle and Partners (India) Ltd., who were the Consultants of the Municipal Corporation, and an Officer of the Municipal corporation specially deputed for this purpose, It is really not necessary for the purpose of this petition to refer to the merits and demerits of each of the tenders as evaluated by the Consultants and it is enough to mention that the tenders of four Firms were outright rejected by the Consultants on several grounds, one of the grounds being that in some cases their bids were not competitive with the remaining bids. The Consultants laid down that in the contract specifications, such tenderer must fulfill four mandatory conditions, which were as follows:- (a) Variable declining rate filtration, (b) The feed back system of inlet level control. (C) The level difference of 3 metros between the inlet to the fillers and Chlorine Contract Tank Wet, and (d) The pressure conduit system between the filters and Chlorine Contact Tank. On a consideration of the tender of M/s. Candy Filters (India) Ltd., Respondent No. 5 in the petition, the Consultants came to the conclusion that they were unable to recommend the offer of M/s. Candy Filters primarily because of its basic technical deficiencies. With regard to the other firm viz. M/s. Geo Miller and Co. Pvt. Ltd., the Consultants found that the entire system which the firm intended to use for the first time had never been tested, nor had it been used by them in any of their works and this made the tender of M/s. V. M. Jog and Co., the Consultants found that on assessment, their technical capability for the type and size of the work required by the Corporation was not satisfactory and their offer was higher than the offer of M/s. Degremont International was the only offer which was based on a proven design and its reliability as regards performance could, therefore, be taken as assured.