- (1.) In this Writ Petition the petitioners have prayed for finalising and acceptance of the tender submitted by the petitioners pursuant to the notice inviting tender as published in the Daily Newspaper "PRAJATANTRA" dated May 9, 1992, since the tender submitted by the petitioners being the lowest amongst all the tenderers participating in such tender for the stockyard at Nirgundi.
(2.) A letter has been issued by the Chief of Marketting, Coal India Ltd. dated February 22, 1993 whereby he has given consent to the said Corporation for sanction for wagon for transportation of coal from the various collieries under the Coal India Ltd., to the stockyards at Nirgundi and Jagannathpur. It has been alleged that it has further come to the notice and knowledge of the petitioners that such consent for the said Corporation stock yard at Nirgundi and Jagannathpur was issued by the Chief of Marketing, Coal India Ltd, through the said Mahanadi Coal Fields Ltd. It has further come to the notice and knowledge of the petitioner that the Executive Director of Rail Movement, Railway Board has also been approached by the said authorities for the purpose of sanction of the Railway Programme for movement of the Railway Wagons for transportation of Coal from the pitheads of the various collieries for the said two stockyards. It is needless to state in this connection that the petitioners participated in the said tender in respect of skockyards to be set up the said Corporation at Nirgundi. It has also been submitted on behalf of the petitioners that since the said Corporation floated the tender inviting the public to participate under certain terms and conditions and since pursuant to such invitation of tender, the petitioners participated in the said tender and since the rates quoted by the petitioners in respect of the stockyard at Nirgundi has been found to be the lowest amongst the other participating tenderers for the same, the respondent Corporation is obliged to accept the said tender of the petitioners. The Respondent Coal India Ltd. as well as the Railway Authorities and the said Mahanadi Coal Fields Ltd. are also obliged to see that the said Corporation does not proceed to obtain the sanction of the programme for movement of railways for transportation of coal from the pitheds of the collieries to the said Nirgundi stockyard without the observance of the principles of natural justice by the said Corporation in the matter of acceptance of the tender.
(3.) The only contention of the respondents in this writ application is that this Court has no territorial jurisdiction to entertain and proceed with the writ petition. It has been submitted on behalf of the respondent Nos. 2 and 3 that this Court has no territorial jurisdiction over the matter and, as such, the interim order passed in the writ application is without jurisdiction and in 'non est'. It has also been submitted that in the event allegations made in the petition are correct, the petitioner may have a good case on merits but the question of law that arises is whether this Court has any territorial jurisdiction to entertain and to hear the matter and pass orders therein since according to the said respondents the entire work commencing from invitation of tenders and culminating with the finalisation thereof and award of work to some other tenderer, has taken place in Cuttack, within the State of Orissa and no part thereof has taken place within the State of West Bengal. It has been submitted on behalf of the said respondent that assuming for the sake of argument that there are several tenderers and hypothetically speaking one each from every state, in respect of the very same transaction, and cause of action, the High Courts throughout India will have the territorial jurisdiction to entertain and decide the dispute. Such a situation, it has been submitted will militate against the salutary principle of avoidance of multiplicity of proceedings. It is further submitted that the only Court of competent jurisdiction to entertain the writ petition is the Orissa High Court situated at Cuttack.;