Anand Comforts PVT. LTD. vs. The State Of Karnataka

The second respondent has rejected petitioner's bid, and the reason assigned by the second respondent for such decision is as follows: HC-KAR NC: 2026:KHC:3440 "As per tender condition No.5[ii] "The bidder or his authorized dealer should have at least one sales centre in each district of Karnataka for the previous three years i.e., 2022-23, 2023- 24 and 2024-25. The bidder shall furnish copies of the Goods and Service Tax [GST] registration certificates issued by the competent authority.". In accordance with the above condition the GST numbers and their corresponding HSN codes furnished by the bidders have been verified. [HSN is an international system used to classify goods in a uniform manner. It helps identify the type of product, its nature and applicable tax rate under GST. When a business obtains a GST number, it must mention the HSN code on its invoices and returns. This helps identify the types of goods being traded with respect to the above and considering the nature of the items listed in the tender [supply of rubberised coir mattress, bedsheet polyurethane fibre pillow, woollen blanket, jamakhana] the HSN codes associated with the GST numbers submitted by the bidder for the respective districts [Vijayapura, Chikkaballapur, Chitradurga, Davangere, Gadag, Haveri, Kolar, Mandya, Shivamogga, Uttara Kannada and Vijayanagar] do not correspond to or match HC-KAR NC: 2026:KHC:3440 the category of goods mentioned in the tender. After discussion in the meeting, the committee unanimously decided that the bidder is not eligible to open the financial bid."

The petition is taken up for final disposal with Sri Kiran V Ron, the learned Additional Advocate General placing on record certain photographs to demonstrate urgency and submitting that the tender is floated calling for bids to supply Bedding Kits because of the sad state of the bedding facilities in HC-KAR NC: 2026:KHC:3440 the concerned hostels. Sri Vikram Huilgol, the learned Senior Counsel for the third respondent, reiterating the urgency submits that the third respondent has got the goods ready and unless the goods are supplied, the third respondent would be under constraints.

Sri Pramod N Kathavi submits that the General Condition No. 5[ii] only stipulates that a bidder/the bidder's authorised dealer should have at least one Sale Centre in each district for the relevant three years and that the bidder should furnish a copy of the Certificate but this Condition does not specify that the Certificate will be the basis for the Tender Accepting Authority to verify whether a bidder/the bidder's authorised dealer is engaged in the business of the Bedding Kits in each district and that unless it is specifically stipulated so in the tender, the petitioner's bid could not have been rejected on the HC-KAR NC: 2026:KHC:3440 ground that the Certificates furnished by the petitioner does not relate to the Bedding Kits.

In elaboration, Sri Pramod N Kathavi canvasses that the GST portal only permits five fields to enter the HSN Codes and this does not mean that a bidder/its authorised dealer does not deal with goods other than the five goods/services as per the five HSN Codes mentioned in the Portal and that if the Tender Accepting Authority had to verify whether a bidder/its authorised dealer are indeed engaged in the business of Bedding Kits, the authority should have asked for relevant documents and could not have gone by the HSN Codes mentioned in the Certificate. In fact, the learned Senior Counsel relies upon a compilation of the GST Certificates uploaded by the petitioner as part of the tender documents to assert that factually it cannot be disputed that the GST Portal only allows five fields to enter HSN Codes. HC-KAR NC: 2026:KHC:3440

Sri Kiran V Ron and Sri Vikram Huilgol, without proposing to dispute that the GST Portal indeed limits only five fields for HSN Codes or that the General Conditions do not specify that the GST Certificates will be scrutinised to verify whether a dealer is engaged in the business of Bedding Kits, and without joining debate on the assertion that the Tender Condition should have mentioned the same, canvass that the petitioner cannot dispute that the Certificates produced by it contains certain Certificates issued for goods with one or two HSN Codes.

Crucially, the learned Additional Advocate General and the learned Senior Counsel emphasize that it is incumbent on every bidder to submit subsisting GST Certificates of its Authorised Dealers and that the petitioner cannot dispute that the Certificate produced by one of its Authorised Dealer HC-KAR NC: 2026:KHC:3440 had been cancelled suo motu way back in the year 2022. 8. The question formulated for consideration in view of the rival submissions is: Whether this Court must interfere with the decision to reject the petitioner's technical bid when the petitioner is unable to dispute that one of its authorized dealers had cancelled the GST registration much prior to the date of the submission.

It is not being argued before this Court that the bid would be complete if an authorized dealer of a bidder did not have a valid GST Certificate. This would be significant because it is undisputed that one of the petitioner's Authorised Dealers had suo motu cancelled the GST Certificate much prior to the date of the submission. Sri Pramod N Kathavi argues that the petitioner is not informed about this and if the petitioner was informed, it could HC-KAR NC: 2026:KHC:3440 have had an opportunity to substitute the Authorised dealer with another who possessed a valid GST registration Certificate.

This proposition does not persuade this Court because it must be incontrovertible that the onus of making a complete submission must be on the bidder in terms of the Tender Conditions and that the complete submission will be only when all the prescribed documents are submitted or uploaded. The petitioner should have uploaded the valid GST Registration Certificate of every Authorised Dealer but has failed on this count in submitting the details of a suspended GST Registration Certificate of one of its authorised dealers. As such, this Court answers the question framed against the petitioner and the petition is rejected. (B M SHYAM PRASAD) JUDGE AN/-