Arappor asks Chennai Corporation to cancel EV maintenance contract

In its complaint to Corporation Commissioner Gagandeep Singh Bedi, Arappor Iyakkam convener Jayaram Venkatesan said the civic body should cancel the tenders finalised for the annual maintenance for 419 battery operated 3-wheelers and take action against the engineers responsible for the tender fixing.

In July, the civic body had invited bids for annual maintenance of the battery vehicles used for solid waste management in four packages with a tender value of Rs 1.18 crore. Though all the tenders had 7 to 10 bidders, the tender conditions were fixed in such a way that only one firm qualified for the financial bid in all four packages.

“All the four packages were awarded as a single bid to one company, which is against the TN Transparency in Tenders Act. All other bidders, including manufacturers of battery vehicles, were disqualified,” he said.

Rather than seeking experience for the last three financial years, the Corporation put up a condition that the bidder should have supplied 50 vehicles on average from April 2016 to March 2019 to any government, quasi-government or local bodies in India. Excluding the recent years, 2019-20 and 2020-21, was mala fide in nature and was done to restrict competition and ensure that Best and Fast Metal Fab alone qualified in the technical bid stage of the tender, he said.

Also, while companies with same shareholders or related parties were prohibited from participation, Best and Fast Metal Fab and E Royce Motors India Private Limited have the same partners or directors, which should have led to disqualification of their bid, Jayaram added, urging the Commissioner to cancel the contract and suspend all officials involved for collusive bidding.