- (1.) HEARD counsel on both sides.
(2.) THE petitioner in W.P. (C) No, 2899 of 2003 is the appellant. Pursuant to a notice dated 25.2.2003. inviting tenders, the petitioner -appellant submitted his tender. It is seen that the appellant was the sole tenderer. This became clear when the technical bid submitted by the appellant was opened on 13.3.2003. Thereafter, according to the appellant, his financial bid was also opened on 21.5.2003. Meanwhile, the Chief Engineer took a decision to cancel the particular notice inviting tenders on the ground that there was only a solitary bidder and there was no adequate competition. Thus a fresh notice Inviting tenders was published. At this stage the appellant filed the writ petition challenging the action of the respondents and claiming that its bid should have been accepted and the contract should have been awarded to it. On behalf of the State, it was submitted that as per the Bihar Finance Rules and as per the circular issued by the Government, when there was only a single bidder in response to a notice inviting tender, as a matter of policy, the notice inviting that tender had to be cancelled and a fresh tender had to be floated. There was nothing malafide in not proceeding further and in not accepting the tender of the appellant. The appellant had no right as such to have the work given to him. Hence, the writ petition was liable to be dismissed. The learned Single Judge took the view that the cancellation was justified, in view of the Circular issued by the Government and as per the Bihar Finance Rules. The learned Judge also stated that the cancellation was effected before the opening of the financial bid and that the financial bid of the appellant could not have been opened. The learned Judge hence dismissed the writ petition.
(3.) LEARNED counsel for the appellant argued that the learned Single Judge was not correct in thinking that the financial bid of the appellant was not opened It was, as a matter of fact, opened on 21.5.2003 and the cancellation of the notice, inviting tenders, took place only on 12.6.2003. Counsel also argued that the decision communicated on 12.6.2003 was issued even before the formal decision was taken to cancel the tender on 21.6.2003. He also relied on Annexure -7 to the writ petition to point out that in the case of another tender, where there was only a single bidder, the State has accepted that bid and had awarded the work. The Circular issued by the Government and the Bihar Finance Rules, which were being followed in the State of Bihar, were not followed in the State of Jharkhand and they need not be followed.;