CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Friday directed the Airports Authority of India (AAI) to call for a fresh tender for Appointment of Master Concessionaire to design, build, finance, operate and maintain general retail outlets at the Chennai Airport. Justice M Duraiswamy set-aside the bid submitted by Bangalore-based Evolve Business Ventures (EBV) and declared it as contrary to the tender conditions of Request For Proposal (RFP) dated October 2016. The order was passed on a petition filed by Travel News Services (India), New Delhi. In October 2016, the AAI (Southern Region) floated a tender for which EBV was declared the highest bidder.
However, according to the petitioner, two firms that were placing bids – Bhawar Lifestyle and EBV – were related and under the same management team. “The relationship between two bidders need not necessarily be corporate relationship, but a close relationship of two bidders that puts either or both of them in a position to have access to each other information about or to influence the proposal of either or each other, shall be deemed to have conflict of interest,” said Justice Duraiswamy. The petitioner had written to the AAI authorities highlighting the violation of RFP conditions and requested them to disqualify the bids submitted by the two firms. However, the AAI did not pay heed to this and opened the financial bids on December 22, 2016.
Both Bhawar Lifestyle and EBV are Bengaluru-based firms that were allegedly carrying on business in the same premises and had also engaged a common consultant, who had accidentally mentioned the Account ID of EBV in the Bhawar Lifestyle’s EMD challan.“The Conflict of Interest is an eligibility criteria even for short-listing the bidders. When there is a disqualification clause prescribed by the tender documents, if the court exercising Writ jurisdiction finds such disqualification, Article 226 will be invoked and such tender process will be declared illegal,” said Justice Duraiswamy.
Travel News Services (India) is involved in operation and management of travel retail shops, which sell and deal in travel retail goods for sale at airports and other places. In order to operate at various airports in the country, the company has signed contracts to operate with AAI and other Airport Operators of India.