HC reserves verdict on Tata Motor’s plea against disqualification by BEST

A division bench of Justice Sanjay V Gangapurwala and Justice Madhav J Jamdar concluded the hearing on the Tata Motors plea challenging the May 6 decision.

The BEST had published a tender notice for the operation of stage carriage services of 1,400 single decker AC electric buses (with driver) for Mumbai and its suburbs on a gross cost contract (GCC) model for 12 years.

Tata Motors, through senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi who was briefed by the team of Karanjawala & Company, argued that the company’s technical bid was arbitrarily rejected to give an unfair favour to Evey Trans Private Limited, which won the tender. The company said that BEST selectively relaxed norms to allow other bidders and this benefitted Evey Trans and even waived certain requirements.

Further, Tata Motors said that its bid, in conformity with tender conditions, had provided a guarantee that its buses can ply 200 km on a charge of 80 per cent without any interruption.

The plea said the BEST had erroneously declared the bid submitted by Tata Motors as ‘technically non-responsive’ and sought it to be reviewed.

In its reply to the plea, the BEST said that the company has no locus (standing) to question the process once its bid was declared ‘technically non-responsive’.

The transport authority’s reply stated that company was a bidder in a tender process and its bid was declared ‘technically non-responsive’ for allegedly deviating from tender specifications, and hence it has no locus to question the process.

The BEST through senior advocate Venkatesh Dhond clarified that Tata Motors deviated from the conditions to the extent that it was to submit the models after testing them under simulated conditions using Automotive Industry Standards (AIS) measures. However, the transport authority had mandated the buses to be tested under ‘Actual Operating Conditions’ (AOC), which included the number of people being carried, the road conditions and the traffic.