Ramesh Ranganathan, J.

1. This appeal, under Clause 15 of the Letters Patent, is preferred by the Telangana State Road Transport Corporation against the order passed by the learned Single Judge in WP No. 31113 of 2016 dated 12.3.2018.

2. Facts, to the limited extent necessary, are that the appellant invited tenders, for allotment of sweeping and cleaning of the main, Class-A and Class-B Bus Stations, and the maintenance of C-Class Bus Stations in Nalgonda Region, on 23.2.2016. Pursuant thereto a letter of acceptance was offered to the successful bidder on 14.3.2016. Aggrieved thereby, the respondent-writ petitioners filed WP No. 8604 of 2016 to declare the action of the respondents in deviating from the essential conditions laid down in the tender notification, as well as the tender schedule issued by the Regional Manager, vide tender notification dated 23.2.2016, and to declare the action of the Regional Manager, in resorting to drawal of lots of the tenderers who did not even fulfil the eligibility criteria of fulfilling the essential conditions in the tender notification as well as the tender schedule, as violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India. A consequential direction was sought to declare the tender, submitted by respondents 3 and 6, as invalid tender applications; and to direct the Regional Manager not to finalise the tenders by awarding any work to any of the persons who have been picked up in terms of drawal of lots, pursuant to the tender notification dated 23.2.2016, and consider and finalise the tender applications submitted by them and any other eligible tenderers only in terms of the notification dated 23.2.2016. An interim order was passed in WP No. 8604 of 2016 on 4.5.2016, and the Regional Manager was directed to re-examine the entire material filed by respondents 3 and 6, and take a decision afresh. The appellants claim to have undertaken an exercise of review on 5.7.2016 and 22.7.2016, and to have recorded the minutes of such an exercise on 25.7.2016. Pursuant thereto, the most suitable tenderers were issued work allotment orders on 10.7.2016 inviting them to enter into an agreement with the appellant.

3. Questioning the work allotment orders, issued by the appellants to respondents 4 and 6 in WP No. 8604 of 2016 (respondents 3 and 4 in WP No. 31113 of 2016), the respondents-writ petitioners herein filed WP No. 31113 of 2016; and a status quo order was passed on 15.9.2016. This order of status quo was in force till the writ petitions were eventually disposed of by the order under appeal dated 12.3.2018. As a result of the interim orders, in both the writ petitions, the appellant has been unable to enter into an agreement with the successful tenderers for the past two years four months ever since 23.2.2016.

4. During the course of final hearing of both the writ petitions, and after having put forth their submissions for sometime, the appellant filed an application seeking permission of the learned Single Judge to withdraw the tender notification, and to issue a notification afresh. This request of the appellant was rejected by the learned Single Judge observing that, when the vacate stay petitions were taken up for consideration, the Counsel had agreed for the final disposal of the writ petitions; after the respective submissions were heard the appellant was directed, by order dated 31.1.2018, to produce the record whereby tenders were evaluated; at that stage, IA No. 1 of 2018 was filed on behalf of the appellant-Corporation stating that they had decided to cancel the entire tender notification due to long lapse of time; it was averred that the period of contract was two years, and such period was over; the entire tender process was completed, the contractors were shortlisted, and contracts were awarded; all along, the appellant-Corporation had hotly contested the claim of the respondents on eligibility criteria; it had justified its action in processing the tenders of respondents 3 and 4