IMPORTANT POINT
The court established that the Engineer-in-Charge has the authority to determine the contract in cases of delay, inferior workmanship, or failure to complete the work within the stipulated period, and such determination results in the forfeiture of deposits and disqualification from future tendering processes.

JUDGMENT

1. Heard Mrs. L. Ayangleima, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner, Mr. W. Darakishwor, learned senior panel counsel appearing for the respondent No. 1 and Mr. D. Julius Riamei, learned counsel appearing for the respondents No. 2 & 3.

The present writ petition had been filed with a prayer for quashing and setting aside the show-cause notices dated 04.09.2019 and 12.09.2019 as well as the notice on final action under clause 3 of the agreement dated 30.09.2019 thereby determining the contract earlier awarded to the petitioner.

2. The case of the petitioner is that the Assistant Joint Manager (Civil Engineering) of the Food Corporation of India (FCI), Regional Office, Manipur, issued an E-tender notice dated 12.03.2018 inviting online percentage rate tender under two bids system from the eligible contractors for executing two works, viz., (i) providing tube well and safe drinking water facility at FSD Ukhrul, Manipur and (ii) repairing of office building and AR & MO works at SD Ukhrul, Manipur.

The petitioner being a registered special class work contractor and being an eligible bidder participated in the tender process by submitting his bids in respect of the contract work for providing tube well and safe drinking water facility at SD Ukhrul, Manipur. As the bid submitted by the petitioner was found to be the lowest, the respondent No. 3 issued a work order dated 18.05.2018 in favour of the petitioner and in the said work order, it is stipulated that the time allowed for carrying out the work shall be two months from the 15th day after issue of the said work order.

3. On the date of issuance of the work order dated 18.05.2018, the petitioner entered into a formal agreement with the respondent No. 3 to the effect that the petitioner shall complete execution of the contract work within the period prescribed/stipulated in the work order and to maintain the same at the cost of the petitioner for a period of six months. It is the case of the petitioner that after executing the formal agreement, he visited the work site and started executing the work under the supervision of the respondent No. 3, however, due to law and order problem on the road from Imphal to Ukhrul and as the hiring charges of heavy drilling machineries for drilling tube well were very high, the petitioner could not hire the said machineries as such, the petitioner executed the contract work by drilling the tube well manually by engaging expert and skilled workers. It is the case of the petitioner that he informed the respondent No. 3 about his inability to hire heavy drilling machineries and about the arrangement of skilled workers by submitting a letter dated 25.95.2018 and continued executing the contract work with the aim to complete it within the stipulated period.

In response to the aforesaid letter of the petitioner dated 25.05.2018, the respondent No. 3 wrote a letter dated 09.07.2018, thereby informing the petitioner that the contract work had been awarded to him at his own independently quoted rate and hence, no claims for high hiring charges of heavy drilling machineries will be entertained by the office at that stage and directing the petitioner to execute work strictly as per schedule of the work.

4. As the petitioner could not complete the execution of the contract work in times, he submitted an application dated 20.07.2018 to the respondent No. 3 for extending the time of completion of the work w.e.f. 20.07.2018 till 30.09.2018 and according to the petitioner, the respondent No. 3 allowed the request of the petitioner and the petitioner completed executing the whole work within the extended period.

5. It is the case of the petitioner that after about 11 months from the date of completion of the contract work, the petitioner received two show-cause notices dated 04.09.2019 and 12.09.2019 from the respondent No. 3 thereby informing the petitioner to show-cause within 7 days as to why action under clause 3(a) and/ or 3(b) of the terms and agreeme