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AKIL KURESHI, SANDEEP MEHTA
Rohit Burad – Appellant
Versus
Rajasthan Industrial Development And Investment Coropration Ltd. (Riico) – Respondent
JUDGMENT
These appeals arise out of a common background and are directed against the common judgment passed by the learned Single Judge dated 13.09.2021 involving similar issues of facts and law. For convenience, we may refer to the facts arising in Spl. Appl. Writ No. 599/2021.
The appellant-original petitioner had applied for e-auction in response to the notice issued by the RIICO on 04.09.2020 for allotting industrial plots in Naya Goan, Pali area. The reserved price for the plots in question was fixed at Rs. 1200 per sq. mtrs.
There were several bids for individual plots, however, for the plot which the petitioner had made his offer, he was the sole bidder. He had offered rate of Rs. 1210 per sq.-mtrs. Several similar instances of single bid making offer for the individual plots also came to the notice of RIICO authorities. The RIICO decided to reject all these offers and returned the earnest money deposited.
Thereupon, the petitioner approached this Court by filing Civil Writ Petition No. 249/2021 and challenged the decision of the authorities.
In brief, the case of the petitioner was that the petitioner's bid was higher than the offset price fixed by the RIICO and was wrongly reje
The court affirmed that auction authorities have discretion to reject bids, even if they are the highest, based on competitive bidding considerations.
The authority has the right to cancel the highest bid and the bids must be competitive. The authority reserves the right to accept or reject any bid without assigning any reason.
Bidders participating in tender process have no other right except right to equality and fair treatment in matter of evaluation of competitive bids offered by interested persons in response to notice....
Point of Law - Once State decides to grant any right or privilege to others, then there is no escape from rigour of Article 14.
The authority conducting an auction has the right to reject the highest bid and the decision-making process must be fair and reasonable.
The highest bidder in an auction does not have a vested right, and the authority has the discretion to cancel bids in the interest of public revenue.
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