Indian passport services controversy: Supreme Court upholds UAE tender ruling

Dubai: The Supreme Court of India has dismissed the Centre's challenge to the Delhi High Court's decision to quash the Ministry of External Affairs' (MEA) tender process for outsourcing passport, visa and consular services at Indian missions in the UAE.

The apex court also ensured there would be no disruption to services by allowing the MEA to make temporary arrangements until a fresh tender process is completed.

A Bench led by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant refused to interfere with the Delhi High Court's ruling and directed the Centre to comply with its directions within three months, according to ANI.

Will services be impacted?

To ensure uninterrupted passport and consular services, the Supreme Court modified the High Court's order.

It allowed the MEA to continue with the existing service providers or temporarily engage the lowest (L-1) bidders whose contracts had earlier been set aside. The court also permitted the ministry to adopt any other suitable arrangement to keep services running at the four Indian missions.

The interim arrangement, the court clarified, will not create any special rights for any party and will remain in place only until a fresh tender process is completed.

According to Live Law, a Bench comprising Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice V Mohana passed the order after hearing Solicitor General Tushar Mehta for the Union Government and Senior Advocates Kapil Sibal, AM Singhvi and Shyam Divan for the private parties (E Trav Tech Limited and Verasys Limited).

The government had challenged the Delhi High Court's July 15 judgment, which found serious flaws in the way bids submitted by private companies were evaluated for the outsourcing contracts.

The High Court had ruled that the technical evaluation process was unfair and lacked transparency, holding that it violated Article 14 of the Constitution, which guarantees equality before the law.

During this morning's hearing, however, Chief Justice Surya Kant questioned the government's position, observing: "But you invited the High Court order by not giving grounds."

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta argued that the tender's marking system had to be interpreted practically across multiple bids and warned that a literal reading of the conditions could produce arbitrary outcomes.

Justice Joymalya Bagchi responded that this was precisely the concern identified by the Delhi High Court.

"The High Court says that the terms governing the assessment of bids were not clearly reflected and that they created an unworkable situation. If that is so, then as per the law declared by this Court, you cannot change the terms of a tender document after the tender process has commenced," Justice Bagchi observed.

The Solicitor General also submitted that records relating to the tender process had been produced before the High Court in a sealed cover and offered to place them before the Supreme Court. However, the Bench declined to interfere with the High Court's judgment.

How did the dispute begin?

The controversy began after the MEA overhauled contracts for operating Indian Consular Application Centres overseas.

Long-time service providers BLS International and SGIVS Global, which had managed Indian consular centres in the UAE, were no longer part of the new process after BLS was debarred from bidding for fresh contracts.

Alhind Tours & Travels LLC - a travel business with operations in India and the UAE, subsequently emerged as the successful bidder for operations in the UAE with the handover initially scheduled for July 1.

However, unsuccessful bidders challenged the technical evaluation process before the Delhi High Court.

On July 15, the High Court quashed the tender process, ruling that the technical evaluation was arbitrary, lacked transparency and violated principles of fairness.

It found that identical proposals had received inconsistent scores across different missions without any disclosed rationale and directed the MEA to issue fresh Requests for Proposal.

What happens now?

The Supreme Court has now upheld that decision while ensuring that passport and visa services continue without interruption.

The MEA has been asked to complete a fresh tender process, preferably within three months, while complying with the Delhi High Court's directions.

Due to the ongoing legal hurdles, Indian diplomatic missions in Abu Dhabi and Dubai have been providing the passport and consular services from their premises.