- (1.) LEARNED counsels for the petitioners submit that the controversy involved in the present writ petitions is covered by a decision of this Court in the caes of Smt. Kamal Jeet Kaur Vs. State of Rajasthan & Ors., (SBCWP No.No.12242/2012 -decided on 24.09.2013 along -with 10 connected writ petitions), wherein while allowing the writ petitions filed by the petitioners against the Rajasthan Housing Board has been allowed, while holding as under: - "6. The defence taken by the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board before this Court in the present cases is by way of a common reply filed in the aforesaid two writ petitions is that the said auctions even though were held after determining the MSP in the year 2012 but the Chairman of the Rajasthan Housing Board found that the bids received and tentatively accepted by the Rajasthan Housing Board on the spot were only marginally above the MSP fixed and, therefore, in the office note -sheet, produced before this Court by the petitioner as well as by the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board on account of the quoted hand written note of the Chairman of Rajasthan Housing Board, the entire auction process was set aside and the learned Chairman, Mr. Paras Ram Mordia, wrote the following note on the said order -sheet " MSP : Sd/ - Paras Ram Mordia." 7. This note of learned Chairman of the Rajasthan Housing Board was despite the report of the Deputy Housing Commissioner (in para No.111 of the said order - sheet) that the "proposal in above paras can be agreed, pl. The said office note has been produced by the petitioner, Kamal Jeet Kaur, along -with her writ petition as Annex.8 (SBCWP No.12242/2012), which is quoted herein below for ready reference: - ...[VERNACULAR TEXT OMMITED]... 114. In compliance to para 113/N fair rejection letter is put up for perusal, approval and sign. Please. Sd/ - 01.08.12." 8. Learned counsel for the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board, Mr. K.N. Vyas and Mr. P.C. Sharma, submitted that new MSP was determined by the Rajasthan Housing Board vide order dated 19.02.2013 and illustratively they have submitted that as against the MSP of Rs.10,000/ - for Plot No.2/107 -A, Hanumangarh, in the case of petitioner, Kamal Jeet Kaur, the new MSP has been now determined at Rs.14,000/ - per square meter. No MSP has been fixed by the Rajasthan Housing Board for the said plots at Jodhpur and other districts. Learned counsel for the respondents have also illustratively submitted that for Plot No.3/168 -A, at serial No.15 (page 75 of the paper book), the said plot against the MSP of Rs.7,000/ - was put to auction and auction bid of Rs.7,300/ - only has been received vide reply page 79 of the paper book, in favour of one Sh. Seen Kumar. By these illustrations, the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board has sought to defend the cancellation of entire auction process held at different places in pursuance of the Advertisements of the year 2012, although the bid(s) were admittedly higher than the MSP fixed in that year and duly notified in the said Advertisement itself and the entire auction process was cancelled by the order of the Chairman, as quoted above. They have submitted that unless the concluded contract came into being by the offer of the petitioner/s duly accepted by the Rajasthan Housing Board, and duly approved by the State Government, no right vested in the present petitioners and the writ petitions deserve to be dismissed. 9. I have heard the learned counsels for the parties at length and given my thoughtful consideration to the rival submissions made by the learned counsel for the parties. 10. The sanctity of the contractual process, specially when they are entered into by Government or its instrumentalities, has to be zealously guarded. The public authorities like the Rajasthan Housing Board, which has been incorporated and exist mainly for public welfare and is supposed to develop the residential colonies for the public at large at economical rates, cannot be expected to act like mere shopkeepers or retailers or property dealers. The auction proceedings initiated in the present case earlier in the year 2012 in various Districts were duly notified by the Rajasthan Housing Board in the said Advertisements themselves and with wide publicity spending a huge sum of public money. There is no dispute before this Court that the Bids received from the present petitioners were higher than the MSP fixed by the Rajasthan Housing Board. In some cases, like in the case of Smt. Santosh Joshi, as against the MSP of Rs.15,000/ -, bid price was Rs.21,501/ - per square meter of the plot in question. In other cases also, it was definitely higher though percentage of variance between the bid price and the MSP may vary from case to case. 11. While undertaking the approval process, the Rajasthan Housing Board, the quoted portion of the office note would indicate that while in some cases, the bids were recommended to be accepted, whereas in some other cases, it was recommended not to be accepted and the individual auction proposals were recommended to be accepted by the Deputy Housing Commissioner on case to case basis, but the entire process was set aside by the aforesaid one line order of the learned Chairman of the Rajasthan Housing Board that new auction be held after new MSP is determined. No specific or exclusive power of Chairman of Housing Board to do so has been pointed out before this Court in the relevant Statute governing the functioning of respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board. From the reply filed by the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board, it is clear that after one year, in the year 2013 vide order dated 19.02.2013, the MSP now fixed is certainly higher than the MSP fixed last in the year 2012. It would bound to be so with the inflation and prices of land going up all around. If this could be a valid reason for setting at naught the entire auction proceedings, this Court is of the opinion that the responsible officer of the Rajasthan Housing Board, not less than, the Chairman, ought to have known the things in a better manner. He brushed aside the entire auction proceedings by a stroke of pen arbitrarily on the pretext of 'fresh auction proceedings be held after new MSP is determined'. A public authority in the first instance, was not expected to cancel the public auctions so arbitrarily, in which huge amount must have been spent by the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board, for advertising the auctions in various newspapers, media etc. and then only holding the auction by assembly of various staff at auction places and also inviting people at large to make their offers. 12. The Chairman of the Rajasthan Housing Board, with great respect, does not appear to have given even a second thought before he wrote the aforesaid quoted one liner order. In public bodies and public authorities, a better sense of responsibility is what the least, this Court could expect while examining the said decision making process in a judicial review under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. Nothing of this sort appears to be reflected in the record produced by the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board before this Court. While admittedly, the MSP was fixed in the earlier auction process also and the bids have been received at higher level than the MSP fixed, prima - facie, the aforesaid alleged reasons given by the Chairman, could not furnish a valid reason to set aside the entire auction proceedings on the pretext of fixing new MSP. The fixation of marginally higher MSP, that too, after one year in the year 2013, does not justify the cancellation of the earlier auction ex -post facto. The learned Chairman also did not to assign any reasons for not accepting the recommendations of the Deputy Housing Commissioner for accepting some of the offered Bids as would appear from the office -note, quoted above. 13. The contention of the learned counsels for the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board that no concluded contract came into being with the petitioners, is also misconceived. Once, they accepted the 15% amount of the highest bidders i.e. the petitioners, a concluded contract definitely came into existence and the subsequent proceedings undertaken for approval of such bids, was only their internal affair before conveying the final acceptance of the bids to the successful bidders/petitioners. If the reason for cancellation of the auction proceedings is not found to be germane by this Court, formal conveying of such acceptance was a mere formality. Therefore, it cannot be contended by the respondents that no concluded contract came into being and the petitioners did not get any right vested in them. 14. The Division Bench of this Court in M/s Ridhi Sidhi Associates Vs. State of Rajasthan and Ors., reported in 2010 (1) WLC 1, has held as under: - "13. The judgment of Learned Single of this court in H.U.Construction company and others vs. The State of Rajasthan and ors. - 1993 (1) W.L.C.(Raj.) 280, which was relied upon by the writ petitioners and also learned Single Judge in the present case is also distinguishable in the facts of the present case. In the said case, the court interfered before confirmation of sale because the price offered by the subsequent tenderer was more than 25% more than the successful bidder and since in the case of contract for royalty collection the auction was knocked down at Rs.2.56 crores and subsequent writ petitioners offered to take same contract for Rs.4 crores, the learned Single Judge directed the respondent State to negotiate again for higher bid. 14. In the present case, we find that the writ petitioner M/s Parth Network (P) Ltd. who did not participate in the bidding process, according to him being prevented by some other persons, the particulars of which or any action taken by him for the same is conspicuous by its absence, has offered to take the said contract at Rs.84 crores and the contract was finalized in favour of present appellant at Rs. 81.77 crores and the difference is less than 5%. The State has categorically stated in its reply that the petitioner did not participate in the said bidding process and there was no hindrance or obstruction in his way to participate in the same and the respondent State had taken all measures to maintain law and order situation at the spot in the present case on 4/2/2009 when the tenders were opened and the highest bid of present appellant was found. 15. A perusal of letter dated 19/1/2009 written by Mining Engineer, Udaipur to the Superintendent of Police Udaipur for making available the police aid on the said date and which was so made available also shows prima facie that there was no occasion for the writ petitioner to have been prevented as alleged by him in the writ petition. If what petitioner seeks in the writ petition was to be allowed, it would be very easy to set at naught any contractual process or even concluded contract merely at the instance of any unsuccessful person, who comes to the Court with bald and vague allegation like in the present case that he was prevented by sufficient cause and now he offers higher bid knowing fully well what was the highest bid and, therefore, contract awarded in favour of somebody should be cancelled. This obviously, cannot be permitted in law. 17. Therefore, we are satisfied that neither the petitioner was prevented by any sufficient cause as alleged by him in submitting the tender on the prescribed date and time nor the contract finalized and concluded in favour of the present appellant can be set aside at the instance of writ petitioners as neither any such fraud has been alleged, much less established, nor the price offered by him is so substantially higher than the price at which the State Government has concluded the contract in favour of present appellants. It would be very easy to make such marginally higher offer for any body, once the tenders of other persons are opened and their bids are known to one and all. Therefore, unless the subsequent offer would have been substantially higher and such subsequent offer was genuine, there was no reason for the Court to interfere with the contractual process under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. Sanctity of process of granting contract specially by Government or public bodies has to be maintained and the very faith in such process shall be shaken if they were to be lightly interfered with or set at naught at the instance of such frivolous and frolic writ petitioners. We are, therefore, unable to agree with the learned Single Judge and great respects, there was no occasion for directing the Principal Secretary of Mines of State of Rajasthan to renegotiate after hearing the writ petitioners and take a fresh decision in the matter. In our considered opinion, a concluded contract came into being between the State Government and present appellant M/s Ridhi Sidhi Associates atleast on 16/2/2009 after the highest bid of the appellant was found on the opening of tenders on 4/2/2009, when the Directorate of Mines and Geology found that the appellant fulfilled all the conditions of deposit of security deposit etc., sent such provisional approval for final approval of said contract and the said process could not be reversed and set at naught at the instance of the writ petitioners. Both the writ petitions deserved to be dismissed." 15. In the case of Rajasthan Housing Board and Anr. Vs. G.S. Investments and Anr. reported in 2007 (1) SCC 477 decided on 31.10.2006, relied upon by, Mr. P.C. Sharma, learned counsel for the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board, the Hon'ble Apex Court has held as under: - "The sale of plots by the Rajasthan Housing Board by means of an auction is essentially a commercial transaction. Even if some defect was found in the ultimate decision resulting in cancellation of the auction, the Court should exercise its discretionary power under Article 226 of the Constitution with great care and action and should exercise it only in furtherance of public interest. The Court should always keep the larger public interest in mind in order to decide whether it should interfere with the decision of the authority. In the present case, there was enough material before the State Government to show that in the past plots in the area had fetched a price of Rs 10,000 per square metre and the highest bid made by the respondent in the present case was nearly half i.e. Rs. 5750 per square metre, which clearly indicated that the auction had not been conducted in a fair manner. If in such a case the State Government took a decision to disapprove the auction held and issued a direction for holding of a fresh auction, obviously the said decision was taken in larger public interest. In these circumstances there was absolutely no occasion for the High Court to entertain the writ petition and issue any direction in favour of the contesting respondent i.e. the highest bidder." The said judgment is clearly distinguishable on facts and rather helps the view taken by this Court. It was a case, where the Bids offered by the bidders was much less than the MSP rates, viz. Rs.5750/ - per square meter against the MSP of Rs.10,000/ - but in the present case, the bids which have been received pursuant to the Advertisement/s, are higher than the MSP rate fixed by the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board itself but the learned Chairman, Rajasthan Housing Board, without assigning any reasons whatsoever has cancelled the entire auction process by one line order, quoted above. Whether he had such exclusive power to do so, is also highly doubtful. 16. This Court is, therefore, satisfied that the bids, which were and are higher than the MSP fixed in 2012 and notified in the Advertisement/s deserved to be accepted and the entire auction proceedings could not be set aside by the respondent Chairman of the Rajasthan Housing Board by the aforesaid Office -Note, which is not at all a reasoned order, much -less an order passed after giving an opportunity of hearing to the petitioners, which is not even contended by the learned counsels for the respondents, and rightly so, before this Court. The impugned order the learned Chairman, Rajasthan Housing Board and the impugned order(s), canceling the auction proceedings, therefore, deserve to be set aside. This Court orders accordingly. 17. The upshot of the above discussion is that the writ petitions filed by the petitioners deserve to be allowed and accordingly, the same are allowed. The part of bid money, refunded back to the petitioner/s, will be paid back by the petitioners and remaining part of auction price also, the petitioners will pay within three months from now, and subject to such payments by the petitioners, the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board shall proceed further to finalize the allotment of plots in question in favour of present petitioners and shall execute the necessary lease -deeds or conveyance deeds in favour of present petitioners and the respondent - Rajasthan Housing Board, shall not demand any interest on the said bid amount from the present petitioners on account of delay caused due to this litigation. No costs. A copy of this order be sent to the concerned parties forthwith."
(2.) LEARNED counsel for the respondents does not dispute the submissions made by the learned counsel for the petitioners. Accordingly, the present writ petitions filed by the petitioners are also allowed in terms of order passed in the case of Smt. Kamal Jeet Kuar (supra).;