Order :

SUNIL BENIWAL, J.

1. The petitioner has preferred this writ petition being aggrieved of the action of the respondent No.2, whereby the bid submitted by the petitioner-firm for operating the boat services at Nakki Lake, Mt. Abu, District Sirohi for the year 2025-2028 was declared to be non-responsive and the bid submitted by the respondent No.4 was declared to be responsive, consequent to which the tender was awarded to respondent no.4.

2. The facts in nutshell are that the respondent No.2 floated a tender whereby bids were invited from the eligible firms for operating boating services at Nakki Lake for the year 2025-2028 vide communication dated 19.12.2025 (Annex.1).

2.1 The petitioner, treating itself to be eligible, submitted its bid. Thereafter, a pre-bid meeting was convened on 29.12.2025 wherein certain modification was made in the Condition No.21 of the tender notice and a corrigendum was issued on 06.01.2026 (Annex.5). The petitioner has also questioned the decision of the respondent No.2 in issuing such corrigendum and changing the terms and conditions of the tender.

2.2 The technical bid was opened on 13.01.2026 and the bid submitted by the petitioner was considered to be non-responsive and the bid submitted by the respondent No.4 was accepted. Hence, this petition.

3. Challenging the action aforesaid, learned counsel for the petitioner made the following submissions:-

(i) The bid submitted by the petitioner was wrongly considered to be non-responsive. The petitioner was having requisite experience, however, despite this, the petitioner-firm was not found to be eligible by the respondents. He drew Court’s attention towards Annex.12, and submitted that the reason assigned for considering the petitioner’s bid as non-responsive is contrary to the record.

(ii) The respondents have committed error not only in treating the petitioner’s bid to be non-responsive but the decision to award contract to respondent No.4 is not only in violation of the Rajasthan Transparency in Public Procurement Act, 2012 (for short, ‘Act of 2012’) and Rajasthan Transparency in Public Procurement Rules, 2013 (for short, ‘the Rules of 2013’) but the same clearly reflects that the entire process has been carried out in a biased manner.

Elaborating the same, learned counsel submitted that the base price for the tender in question was amounting to Rs.7,61,00,000/- and the bid submitted by the respondent No.4 has been accepted at a much lower rate. In no case, the respondents could have reduced the base price and on this count alone, the contract awarded to the respondent No.4 deserves to be cancelled.

(iii) The technical bid is said to have been opened on 13.01.2026, however, Annex.10 clearly shows the status as on 15.01.2026 was that the bid submitted by the petitioner was admitted and that of the respondent No.4 was to be opened. It is submitted that on 15.01.2026, at 11.03 a.m., it is observed that the bid submitted by the petitioner was found to be non- responsive as reflected in Annex.12 and at the same time, the status as noted on 15.01.2026, at 9.56 a.m. (Annex.10), indicates that the bid submitted by the petitioner to be admitted. It is thus, submitted that the respondent No.2, in order to accommodate the respondent No.4, has manipulated the tender proceedings and has proceeded in complete biased manner in not only declaring the petitioner’s bid to be non-responsive but at the same time has proceeded to show undue favour to the respondent No.4 in treating its bid to be responsive. Not only this, the respondents have also acted in arbitrary manner and declared the respondent No.4 as successful bidder and issued work order in a hot and haste manner.

(iv) The respondent no.4 did not possess the requisite documents like solvency certificate and experience certificate which is mentioned in the tender conditions. On the other hand, petitioner possesses relevant experience as it has entered into partnership on 07.01.2026 with one Sunil Kumar Gupta, prop