Tender conditions must maintain a rational nexus with their objectives, and courts should exercise restricted scrutiny in administrative actions unless clear arbitrariness or discrimination is shown.

ORDER :

Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari, C.J.

Challenging certain conditions imposed in the e-Tender dated 3.3.2026 for undertaking live webcasting in the polling stations on the day of polling and recording on the day of counting for the General Elections to Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly, 2026, the present writ petition is filed.

2.1. The case of the petitioner is that the petitioner is a company incorporated under the Companies Act and is engaged in providing advanced surveillance and webcasting systems for elections and other sensitive events. It possesses extensive experience in installing and operating IP based HD camera systems for live monitoring of polling stations across various States and has the necessary technical capability and infrastructure to undertake large scale election surveillance projects.

2.2. It is further stated that the respondents propose to deploy approximately 1,50,000 web based cameras across 75,000 polling stations and 3,744 cameras in counting centres. The petitioner submitted pre-bid queries requesting that the requirement relating to prior installation of 2,500 CCTV cameras in counting centres be dispensed with, since successful execution of large scale polling station webcasting inherently demonstrates the technical capability required for installation of cameras within counting centres, which is comparatively limited in scale and complexity. The petitioner also requested that consortium participation be permitted in order to promote wider competition.

2.3. It is averred that the respondents rejected the said representations through a cryptic response merely stating "Tender condition confirmed", without furnishing any reasons. The impugned eligibility conditions are manifestly arbitrary and disproportionate and operate as an artificial barrier that excludes otherwise technically competent bidders. The conditions, therefore, lack any rational nexus with the object of the tender and are violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India. Hence, the present writ petition.

3.1. Learned Senior Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner submitted that the impugned eligibility criteria mandating that a bidder must have executed installation of at least 2,500 CCTV cameras in counting centres, in addition to having installed live web streaming from not less than 1,00,000 polling station cameras, is ex-facie arbitrary and irrational. He added that the eligibility conditions prescribed in a public tender must bear a rational nexus with the object sought to be achieved and must not be designed in a manner that artificially restricts competition or excludes otherwise competent participants without justification.

3.2. The next submission of learned Senior Counsel for the petitioner is that the impugned condition prohibiting consortiums is highly restrictive and such restriction would only allow one or two entities in the industry to be benefitted by the tender process and eliminating almost all competitors. In other words, he submitted that the impugned tender conditions appear to be tailor-made to restrict participation to a very small number of participants, thereby defeating the objective of competitive tendering.

3.3. It is further submitted that the respondents ought to have given due consideration to the pre-bid queries made by the petitioner, because in respect of similar tender floated for the election to the legislative assembly constituencies for the State of Kerala with unreasonable eligibility criteria and conditions, the same have been withdrawn and the eligibility criteria was appropriately modified by issuing corrigendum, after the unreasonability of such conditions was pointed out by the petitioner.

3.4. In effect, it is submitted that the respondents may be directed to modify the tender conditions and permit participati