The right of the respondents to accept or reject tenders without assigning reasons and the lack of enforceable right for the petitioner at the stage of the decision-making process.

JUDGMENT :

PUSHPA SATHYANARAYANA, J.

Prayer: Writ Petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India praying for a Writ of Certiorarified Mandamus calling for the entire records relating to the issue of the impugned order in intimation dated 12.03.2020 made in Ref. No. 2273/T4/TPT/19, on the file of the second respondent quash the same, restore the tender in Notification No. 2273/T4/TPT/2019, dated 27.08.2019 and to direct the second respondent to grant the work order to the petitioner, L1 holder for 15KL vehicles and 8.5 KL vehicles submitted in the tender.

1. Mr. Vijay Narayan, learned Advocate General assisted by Mr. R. Bala Ramesh, learned Special Government Pleader (Co-operative) appears on behalf of the respondents.

2. With the consent of the learned counsel for the petitioner and the learned Advocate General, this writ petition is taken up for final hearing at the admission stage itself via Videoconferencing, on account of the COVID-19 pandemic situation.

3. Challenging the intimation of the second respondent dated 12.03.2020 made in Ref. No. 2273/T4/TPT/19 and seeking to restore the said tender issued on 27.08.2019 and also seeking a consequential direction to the second respondent to grant the work order to the petitioner, being he L1 holder for 15KL vehicles and 8.5 KL vehicles, this writ petition is filed.

4. The petitioner firm, which is engaged in the business of milk transportation owning insulated transport vehicles of various capacities, and it stood as one of the successful bidders in the tender, which was called for by the second respondent vide Notification No. 2273/T4/TPT/2019 on 27.09.2018 for supply of 303 Nos. of various Capacities Road Milk Tankers on Hire for Transportation of Milk for a period of three years from 2019-2022.

4.1. The petitioner has stated that the technical bid of the tender applications was opened on 10.10.2019 and the qualified list of tenderers should be published within 60 days, i.e. on or before 10.12.2019. But the second respondent wantonly delayed the opening of the price bid and it was opened only on 06.02.2020. Though the petitioner’s quote was the lowest, there were other contractors, who had also quoted the same rates.

4.2. It is claimed by the petitioner that Section 10(5) of the Tamil Nadu Transparency in Tenders Act, 1998 (in short “TNTT Act”) confers powers on the Tender Accepting Authority (in short “TAA”) to split the procurement amongst the bidders, who have quoted the same price. Admittedly, the petitioner was declared as L1 on 06.02.2020 and thereafter, negotiations were held by the Tender Committee on the same day, i.e., on 06.02.2020. The petitioner also had given its revised offer at that time. Even thereafter, there was no response.

4.3. It is alleged that though there was a communication dated 13.02.2020 in Ref No. 2273/T4/TPT/2019 from the third respondent to the petitioner informing about the re-negotiation meeting to be held on 14.02.2020 at 2.30 p.m. they are not aware of the same.

4.4. Thus, the petitioner further alleged that though the tender was processed, the second respondent was delaying in issuing the Work Order (for the sake of brevity “WO”) to the petitioner, which constrained the petitioner to file W.P. No. 5954 of 2020 praying a Mandamus seeking for a direction to the second respondent to issue WO to the petitioner.

4.5. The said writ petition was heard along with W.P. Nos. 5834, 5958 and 5960 of 2020, which came up for hearing on 06.03.2020. Even though at the time of admission, it was informed to this Court that the subject tender notification issued earlier was cancelled by the second respondent, as the petitioners’ therein were unaware of the same, this Court had directed the second respondent to upload the decision and also communicate to the petitioners about the decision for cancellation of tender.

4.6. Accordingly, the said intimation was uploaded on 12.03.2020 in the web, wherein, it was stated that the subject tender has been rejected b