Debarment order quashed for lack of adherence to natural justice and proportionality under public procurement law.

JUDGMENT :

SAMEER JAIN, J.

1. The present petition has been filed with the following prayer :

“1) The Impugned order dated 12.06.2025 may kindly be quashed & set aside.

2) And/or any other appropriate order or direction may also kindly be passed in favour of the Petitioner, which this Hon’ble Court may deem fit and proper in the facts and circumstances of the present case.”

2. Brief facts of the instant matter are that the petitioner is a proprietorship firm duly registered with the respective Departments. That the Department of Agriculture marketing through respondent No.5 had issued a notice inviting open competitive bidding dated 07.03.2025 from the firms having valid licenses, for construction and maintenance of around 16 buildings in Jaipur and adjoining areas and qua the same bid documents were to be submitted from 18.03.2025 till 07.04.2025 by 11.00 A.M.

3. That the petitioner participated in the bid for the construction of the work and submitted the technical and financial bid along with the requisite documents within the period specified under the Notice Inviting Bid.

4. That the petitioner-firm, as per terms and conditions, submitted various documents through one of its employees, who inadvertently tempered with the affidavit of Rs.1000/- in order to save money and indulged in deceitful conduct amounting to misrepresentation towards the petitioner-firm, resultant to which the members of the committee as a punitive measure declared the petitioner-firm as non-responsive. Thereafter, the petitioner participated in another tender issued on 28.04.2025 for works in Bharatpur, bids for which were accepted. However, prior to awarding the contract, a defective notice was issued regarding the irregularity in the erstwhile tender dated 07.03.2025. Thereafter, vide impugned order dated 12.06.2025, the petitioner – firm is debarred for two years from participating in the tenders.

SUBMISSIONS OF PETITIONER-FIRM:

5. In this background, learned counsel for the petitioner had submitted that the impugned order dated 12.06.2025 passed by the respondent No.3 - Chief Engineer, Rajasthan State Agriculture Marketing Board is illegal, arbitrary, unreasonable and against the principles of natural justice, as the same is against the terms and conditions of the NIB as well as the provisions of the Rajasthan Transparency Public Procurement Act, 2012 (hereinafter referred as “the Act of 2012”). It was further submitted that the bids submitted by the petitioner-firm in the subsequent tender were approved, in support of the said contention, attention was drawn upon the minutes of the meeting (Annexure-7 and 8).

6. Further, it was submitted that notice dated 28.05.2025 received under Section 80 (2)(B) and 80(2)(D) of the Act of 2012 qua irregularity in the application for bid submitted in furtherance of NIB dated 07.03.2025, in pursuance of which the impugned order is passed, does not meet the legal requirements of a show- cause notice. Moreover, respondents wrongly invoked the provisions of Section 46 (4) of the Act of 2012 as the said Section only entitles the procuring entity to debar the bidder from participating, therefore, the bidder can only be debarred if bid security or the entire performance security is forfeited, whereas, in the case at hand, the petitioners’ bid was declared as non responsive at the preliminary stage, moreso, no such order was passed qua forfeiting which is a preliminary condition for debarment under the provisions of Section 46 of the Act of 2012.

7. Additionally, it was