Bombay HC upholds disqualification of Tata Motors from e-buses tender process

Tata Motors | Representative image

The Bombay High Court on July 5 upheld the decision of the Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) Undertaking to disqualify Tata Motors from a tender bid for operating electric buses in the city.

A bench of Justices S V Gangapurwala and Madhav Jamdar dismissed a plea filed by Tata Motors challenging the disqualification.

The bench held that BEST had been right in disqualifying the Tata Motors. The auto major had approached the HC challenging the BEST’s decision to disqualify it from the tender process for operating 1,400 electric buses for Mumbai.

Tata Motors had participated in the tender process, but its bid was disqualified by BEST following a technical suitability evaluation, the parties had previously told the high court. It had argued that its technical bid was "arbitrarily" rejected to favour the company that won the tender process.

As per the plea filed by the automobile company, BEST had published an e-tender notice on February 26 this year for two-bid e-tender for the operation of stage carriage services for 1,400 single-decker AC electric buses for Mumbai and its suburbs. Tata Motors had submitted its technical and financial bid on April 25, the plea said.

However, on May 6, the BEST published a technical suitability evaluation of the tender and wrongly declared Tata Motors’ bid as "technically non-responsive", alleging the deviation mentioned in respect of operating range was not acceptable. However, BEST denied the allegations and maintained before the HC that it had followed due process in awarding the tender.

The HC in its order said, "The petitioner (Tata) was rightly disqualified." It said that BEST’s decision was "final and binding." The court, however, added that if any discrepancies has occurred in the allocation of the tender for the e-buses, then BEST must consider issuing a fresh tender.