( 1 )

( 2 ) HAVING regard to the urgency of the matter, with the consent of learned counsel for the parties, it is taken up for final disposal at this stage itself.

( 3 ) CHALLENGE in this writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of india is to the legality and propriety of the decision of the Container Corporation of India, a public sector undertaking and respondent No. 1 herein, to award the work of survey of containers and cargo at the Inland Container Depot (ICD for short) Tughlakabad, Delhi to one M/s. Master Marine Services Pvt. Ltd. , respondent No. 2 herein. The petitioner seeks quashing of the award of work, with a direction to the first respondent to allot/award the same to them, being the sole bidder having the requisite qualification and experience as prescribed under the eligibility criteria in the Notice Inviting Tender ( nit for short) dated 15 December, 2003.

( 4 ) THE factual matrix, on which the foundation of this judicial action is laid, is as follows: in December 2003, respondent No. 1 floated a limited tender for hiring the professional services for survey of containers and cargo and ancillary facilities at the ICD for a period of 24 months. The tendering was to be through a two bid process. First part was to consist of "pre-Qualification bid", which was to be accompanied by various documents, inter alia, showing the experience; constitution of the firm/company; the turnover for past three years; a copy of the licence to act as surveyor or/loss assessor under the Insurance Act, 1938 and the earnest money in the form of a bank draft/pay order, etc. The second part was to consist of the financial bid. 4. 2. A reference to some of the relevant instructions regarding submission of the tender, contained in Chapter (I) of the tender documents at this juncture would be apposite. These are as follows: " (9) Tenderer should clearly indicate the name and address of their firm/company/individual, as the case may be, on both the envelopes and should clearly indicate the name of job/work for which tender is being submitted. (11) CONCOR reserves the rights to amend the tender document, if considered necessary with due intimation to respective tenderers prior to the last date of submission. CONCOR also reserves the right to extend the date of submission and opening of tender if considered necessary to allow reasonable time to the tenderers in such cases. (12) CONCOR also reserves the right to accept or reject any tender in part or in full without assigning any reason whatsoever. Relax the tender condition at any stage if considered necessary for the purpose of finalising the contract in the overall interest of the concor and the trade. Accept/reject any or all the technical bids or financial bids. " 4. 3. The eligibility criteria laid down in the Chapter (II) of the said documents was in the following terms: (1) (a) The tenderer must be experienced and qualified surveyor having minimum 2 years experience in the work of survey of import/export cargo and ISO containers. Experience should be supported with Copies of work order/experience for having worked as surveyor with any of the organisations of following type (i) Any Major Port Trust (ii) ICDs/cfss owned by CONCOR/cwc/any other Public Sector undertaking (iii) Cargo terminals managed by Airports Authority of India. Tenders received without proof of such experience will be summarily rejected. (b) The Tenderer should have had an annual turnover of at least Rs. 10 lakhs per year during last three years for every year separately. (c) Tenderer should have employed at least 20 persons including at least two IICL certified supervisors for preceding 3 years. (d) The tenderer must have license to act as surveyor/loss assessor under insurance Act, 1938. 4. 4. The scope of work was spelt out in Chapter (III) of the tender documents. In particular a successful tenderer, to be referred to as a "surveyor" after the award of the tender, was required to provi