Nila Infrastructure Limited vs. Surat Municipal Corporation (Gujarat High court)
Non-payment of GST along with the bid fee to procure a tender would amount to non-compliance with the remittance of bid fee – bidder would be liable for disqualification- Gujarat High court
FULL TEXT OF THE HIGH COURT JUDGMENT / ORDER IS AS FOLLOWS:
1.0. Rule. Shri Dhaval Nanavati, learned advocate waives service of notice of Rule on behalf of respondent no.1 and Shri Mahavir Gadhvi, learned advocate waives service of notice of Rule on behalf of respondent no.2. In the facts and circumstance of the case and with the consent of the learned advocates for the respective parties, present petition is taken up for final hearing today.
2.0. By way of this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the petitioners have prayed for an appropriate writ, direction and order to quash and set aside the impugned decision of the respondent Corporation to disqualify the petitioner no.1 treating its bid as nonresponsive and ineligible on the sole ground that while submitting the bid the petitioner no.1 has not paid Goods and Services Tax (hereinafter referred to as the “GST”) to the respondent with the Bid/ Document Fee.
3.0. The facts leading to the present Special Civil Application in nutshell are as under:
3.1. That the respondent Corporation has issued a Request for Proposal (hereinafter referred to as “RFP”) for “Development of Integrated Group Housing Facility at Dumbhal Tenements of FP No. 18/A TPS No. 33 (Dumbhal) on PPP basis under Redevelopment of Public Housing Scheme2016”. As per the RFP, initially the online bid was to be submitted by 29.03.2017 and the physical bid was to be submitted by 07.04.2017. However, the aforesaid deadlines came to be extended upto 22.06.2017 for the online submission and 01.07.2017 for the physical submission. One of the conditions of the FIR RFP required the bidder to make payment of Rs.18,000/-towards “Bid/ Document Fee”. Pursuant to the first RFP the petitioner no.1 submitted its online bid on 22.06.2017 and the physical bid on 23.06.2017. It is the case on behalf of the petitioners that as per the condition of First RFP, the petitioner no.1 also made the payment of Rs.18000/ towards bid / document fee. It appears that since the petitioner no.1 was the only entity who had submitted its bid in response to the First RFP, the respondent reissued the RFP (hereinafter referred to as ‘Second RFP”) on 1.8.2017 for the tender works. As per the conditions of Second RFP, the online bid was required to be submitted on 07.09.2017 and the physical bid was to be submitted by 15.09.20178. The Second RFP also required the bidder to pay Rs.18000/ towards bid / document fees, however this time the said amount was to be paid along with GST @ 18%. That as per the tender notice, time schedule was as under:
