Nirmaljit Kaur, J.

The writ petition has been preferred seeking quashing of the E-Auction held on 26.09.2017 in respect of auctioning of Block 3D1 in Tehsil Nagaur for grant of mining lease as well as declaration dated 29.09.2017 recommending respondent No. 7 as the preferred bidder, with a further prayer to conduct fresh EAuction.

2. The respondent No. 2 - Director, Mines and Geology issued a Notice Inviting Tender (NIT) for the grant of mining lease under the provisions of Section 1 OB/11 of Mines and Mineral (Development and Regulation) Amendment Act, 2015 and in accordance with Mineral (Auction) Rules, 2015 whereby the mineral blocks for the purpose of grant of mining lease for mineral lime stone through E- auction were notified for inviting bids in digital format only from eligible bidders. In pursuant to the issuance of the NIT, the petitioner company got itself registered on the website of respondent MSTC and obtained its login ID and password. The mining department of State of Rajasthan issued a tender document to all prospective bidders setting out terms and conditions to carry out E-auction for grant of a mining lease for mineral specified therein.

3. The respondent No. 4 and 5 being Mineral State Trading Corporation Ltd. (Commonly known as MSTC) is a mini ratna category -1 PSU under the administrative control of the ministry of Steel, Government of India. The said company acts as a regulating authority for export of ferrous scrap. The State Government had authorised the respondent MSTC for conducting electronic auction through its platform as per Rule 7 of the Mineral (Auction) Rules, 2015.

4. The grievance of the petitioner-company is twofold:

(a) For no fault of the petitioner company and solely on account of the failure of the loop connectivity, the petitioner company was wrongfully deprived from placing a higher bid in comparison to the bid placed by the respondent No. 7. For meeting exigencies, a contact person was nominated in the website of the MSTC. The petitioner contacted the concerned person i.e. respondent No. 8 before the expiry of 8 minutes, but he miserably failed to take remedial measures and further did not halt the bid process until loop was reconnected.

(b) The E-auction process and subsequent declaration of respondent No. 7 as ‘preferred HI bidder’ has caused irreparable loss and injury not only to the petitioner, but also to the respondent No. 1 Government of Rajasthan, in as much as, there is huge loss of almost Rs. 2000 crores in revenue by way of price premium as the petitioner on date is ready to start the bid from 50 onwards which has presently been accepted at 41.60.

5. As per the facts of the case, after completing all the necessary formalities of submitting bank guarantee to the tune of Rs. 9,08,93,886/- in accordance with the requirement of tender document the petitioner company submitted its technical bid. On 22.09.2017, the petitioner JSW Cement Limited, Mumbai along with respondent No. 7 - M/s. Ambuja Cement Limited, Gujarat and Adani Cementations Limited, Gujarat were declared as technically qualified. On 26.09.2017, the conduct of ascending forward electronic auction and submission of Final Price Offer on electronic auction platform was fixed as per the amended time table. Thereafter, the petitioner company logged into the server of MSTC and started registering its bid.

6. For understanding the controversy, it would be appropriate to reproduce the conduct of E-auction which reads as under:—

“b. Conduct of e-auction:

E-auction is the process of inviting binding Final Price Offers from Qualified Bidders through internet for the purpose of determination of the Preferred Bidder. During this process, the Qualified Bidder will be able to submit its Final Price Offer as many times as it wishes against the same mineral block. The Qualified Bidder will remain anonymous to other Qualifie