Mumbai The Bombay high court (HC) on Tuesday concluded hearing the petition filed by Tata Motors, challenging Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) rejection of their tender bid to supply 1,400 electric buses, on account of alleged deviation from tender specifications.
In the petition filed through Karanjawala & Company and Lexicon, Tata Motors also challenged the subsequent issuance of Letter of Acceptance by BEST to another bidder Evey Trans Pvt Ltd. The BEST undertaking on May 6 held the company’s bid for supplying 1,400 electric buses non-responsive on account of alleged deviation from tender specifications.
The division bench of justice S V Gangapurwala and justice Madhav Jamdar was informed by the counsel for Tata Motors that though they had filed their bid in consonance with the tender specifications, their offer was rejected on technical deviations.
Tata Motors submitted that it was the number one electric bus manufacturer in the country and was counted as the second biggest manufacturer of electric buses globally and the other bidders were only leasing companies which sourced their vehicles from other manufacturers. Hence, their bid should have got precedence over the other bidders.
However, BEST in its affidavit in response to the petition filed through Deepak Kottari, stated that the tender submitted by Tata Motors was not as per the format and schedule prescribed in the tender application document.
The affidavit further stated that the petitioner had sought certain deviations in the tendering process which could not be allowed. The court was further informed that as the court had not granted any relief to the petitioners, BEST had in the meantime gone ahead with the tendering process and issued Letters of Acceptance to another bidder for supplying 2,100 electric buses.
The affidavit also referred to the March 11 pre-bid meeting wherein the petitioner had sought certain deviations in the tender but the same were rejected along with the deviations requested by other applicants and the same was conveyed through the minutes of the meeting. However, Tata Motors had filled the tender as per the deviations sought by them in the meeting and hence their application had been rejected and there was nothing wrong on the part of BEST in rejecting the bid of Tata Motors on that ground.