CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has refused to interfere with the tender process initiated by the chief electoral officer (CEO) for Tamil Nadu for surveillance and poll monitoring services for the April 23 polling, stating that tender conditions cannot be modified to suit the petitioners.
The first bench of Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice G Arul Murugan dismissed the petitions filed by I-Net Secure Labs and Innovatiview India Limited, which challenged the eligibility criterion requiring bidders to have an average annual turnover of `100 crore.
“We find no shred of material to prove arbitrariness, perversity, mala fide or bias that would warrant judicial interference,” the bench said in the order on Tuesday.
It stated, “When the respondents have categorically averred that the tender is floated having regard to the time-bound and sensitive nature of election- related activities, and nothing in rebuttal is produced by the petitioner, we do not find any merit in the submissions advanced by the counsel for the petitioner.”
The tender was floated for webcasting at 75,032 polling stations, with two cameras per station, along with CCTV coverage and recording at counting centres. Clause 4(5) of the notification mandates that bidders must have an average annual turnover of `100 crore for the last three audited financial years.
“This court is of the view that the conditions of the tender cannot be altered/modified to make it suitable to the petitioner, as the best person to frame the terms and conditions of the tender is the tender making authority who has the necessary technical and administrative expertise,” the court said.
Senior counsels appearing for the petitioners, argued that the turnover condition was introduced to favour a particular Hyderabad-based company and exclude smaller firms and consortiums.
Terming the condition “ill-founded”, the counsels questioned the rationale for having different criteria across states.