Point of Law : when a bidder who has not been issued the final acceptance of the bid by the competent authority being the highest bidder acquires no vested right ,but the bidder has right to equality and fair treatment in the matter of competitive bids offered by the interested persons in response to the notice inviting tenders in a transparent manner and free from hidden agenda.

JUDGMENT :

Heard Mr. S. Borgohain, learned counsel appearing for the petitioners assisted by learned counsels Mr. Emon Bhattacharya, Mr.Tongpok, Mr. Baplu Chakma and Mr.Lipoklemba, heard Mr.T.B Jamir, learned Sr. Additional Advocate General appearing for the respondent Nos. 1, 2, 3, and also heard Mr. R.Iralu, learned senior counsel assisted by Mr.L.Iralu, learned counsel for private respondent No.5.

1. The facts and circumstances which led to the filing of the present writ petitions and the reasons why it has been listed along with the connected writ petitions may be briefly stated and for the same this Court shall refer to its order dated 04.10.2021:

“2. ………. The Central government in view of improving road connectivity in the state of Nagaland accorded sanction to Nagaland Public Work Department (NPWD) under Northeast Road Sector Development Scheme and in pursuance to the same, NPWD floated NIT dated 13.09.2019, for five number of projects, in which the petitioners were interested in “Tenning to Lekkie” project which was situated in the district of Peren.

3. The entire project was to be executed according to the guidelines issued under MORTH guidelines, March 2019 and Standard Bidding Guideline. The State Respondents held a Pre-Bid-Meeting on 24.9.2019 and the resolution which was adopted in that meeting was contradicting with SBD and the guidelines issued by NEC. The petitioners sought clarification vide letter dated 27.09.2019 but the same proved to be futile. In the above factual context a series of Writ Petitions were filed, and for the sake of convenience those Writ Petitions are penned down here in a chronological order;

W.P.(C) 187/2019:

The subject matter impugned in the petition was that the State respondent’s act of adopting the resolution dated 24.09.2019 in the pre-bid- meeting was contra to the guidelines issued by the NEC and MORTH guidelines March 2019.

The Writ Court was not inclined to grant stay order in the matter as the tender was two tier system i.e. Technical and Financial, so the court was of the view that if the petitioners did not qualify technically the Writ will become infructuous but if the petitioners qualified technically then the interim prayer will be considered on the next date. On 1.11.2019 the matter came up for admission hearing when the Government Advocate placed a letter dated 31.10.2019 issued by the respondent authorities that the minutes of the pre-bid- meetings are not complied which is suggestive that MORTH Guidelines were followed and the Joint-Venture of the Petitioner’s is declared as L 1 in view of the above facts the matter was disposed of as infructuous vide order dated 9.12.2019 by this Court.

II. W.P. (C) 249/2019

This writ petition was filed by the petitioners on 9.12.2019 with a prayer to the Writ Court that since the Petitioner’s Joint Venture has been declared L1 the Letter of Acceptance ought to be issued to the petitioner as per the MORTH guidelines. The said guideline stipulates that LOA must be issued to the L1 on the 75th day from the date of NIT. This Hon’ble Court took cognizance of the matter and asked the State respondents to reply to the same on 23.01.2020.

III. W.P. (C) 3 (K)/2020

On perusal of the order dated 9.12.2019 passed in WP (C) 249/2019 it leaves no doubt that the matter was sub judice but surprisingly the state respondents cancelled the tender vide tender cancellation corrigendum dated 16th December 2019 following by a fresh NIT dated 18.12.2019. The act of the State respondents was prima facie act of administrative review of a Judicial order. The said act of the respondent was challenged by the Petitioner by filing a Writ Petition at Principal Seat at Gauhati which was registered as WP (C) 75/2020 and the Court was pleased to accept the argument canvassed by the Petitioner and granted stay of the impugned notification vide order dated 6.01.2020. Relevan