Court emphasized the limits of judicial intervention in tender processes, maintaining that eligibility criteria must be rational and not arbitrary. The absence of merit in the petition led to its dismissal.

ORDER :

BHARGAV D. KARIA, J.

1. Heard learned advocate Mr.Rohin Bhatt, appearing on behalf of learned advocate Mr.Anand M. Ranpara for the petitioner.

2. By this petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the petitioner has prayed for the following reliefs:

“A. Issue a writ, order or direction, in the nature of mandamus calling for the records pertaining to the impugned RFP issued by the Respondent No. 1, and after going through the same, declare that the process, as laid down in the RFP document was not followed, and thus, declare the entire process as being ab initio null and void.

B. Issue a writ, order or direction, in the nature of mandamus calling for records pertaining to the impugned RFP, and after going through the same, quash the Tender Conditions in Clause 3.2 as being arbitrary and unreasonable;

C. Issue a writ, order, or direction, further directing that the Respondent No. 2 cancel the impugned RFP and invite bids afresh in line with prayers (a) and (b) herein;

D. Pending the hearing and disposal of the present Special Civil Application:

i. Direct Respondent No. 1 to abstain from awarding the tender, or moving forward with the tender process until the disposal of the present Special Civil Application;

ii. Or in the alternate and without prejudice to the above prayer, issue a direction declaring that if Respondent No. 1 awards the tender to any bidder, the same shall be subject to the outcome of the present proceedings."

3. The brief facts of the case are as under:

3.1 The petitioner is a sole Proprietor for providing the manpower, IT and IT-enabled services for organizations and industries and has started its business operations in the year 2004 and has advanced towards adding manpower consultancy services gradually.

3.2 The respondent has issued a Request for Proposal (RFP) on 13.11.2025 regarding empanelment of agencies for providing “IT Technical Manpower” for various Government Departments/Offices, etc.

3.3 According to the petitioner, the eligibility criteria prescribed in Clause 3.2 of the tender document (RFP) provides for average turnover of the company for three tiers, namely, Tier-1 – Rs. 800 Crore or more, Tier-2 – Rs. 100 Crore or more, and Tier-3 – Rs. 50 Crore or more, is absurd, as there is no rationale for prescribing such high criteria of average turnover, which is defined in Sub-Clause 6 of Clause 3.1 containing the eligibility compliance sheet. According to Sub-Clause 6 of Clause 3.1, the bidder should have an average annual turnover as per the eligibility conditions for the respective tier in any last three financial years out of the last seven years, i.e. from 2018-2019 to 2024-2025, as per the certificate issued by a Chartered Accountant.

3.4 Admittedly, the petitioner is not fulfilling the criteria of any of the tiers, as the average turnover of the petitioner is Rs. 25 Crores, as stated by the learned advocate for the petitioner. It is also pertinent to note that the petitioner has not given any financial data or details in the petition and/or any details with regard as to why the turnover criteria prescribed in the bid document is irrational or absurd. It only appears that as the petitioner is not fulfilling the criteria, the petitioner has approached this Court by challenging the turnover criteria without any basis. It is trite law that while exercising the extraordinary jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the Writ Court cannot sit in the seat of the employer and cannot decide as to what should be the criteria prescribed for average turnover in the bid document.

4. Learned advocate Mr.Rohin