In its July 15 judgment, the Delhi High Court directed the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) to issue fresh requests for proposals within one month, holding that the technical evaluation process suffered from a lack of transparency and consistency. The court, however, allowed the existing service provider, VFS Global, to continue operating until a fresh tender is completed and new contracts are awarded.
According to the MEA’s website, the contracts for Australia, the UAE and Kuwait expired on June 30, while the contract for Singapore is due to expire on September 30.
VFS Global suspended acceptance of new passport, visa and consular applications in Australia from July 1, citing instructions from the High Commission of India in Canberra. The company declined to comment on the matter, citing the pending litigation.
The Centre challenged the High Court’s ruling before the Supreme Court on Friday. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta made an urgent mention before a bench comprising Chief Justice of India Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V. Mohana, which agreed to hear the matter on July 20.
During the mention, Mehta told the court that although the High Court had permitted existing service providers to continue temporarily, services had stopped from July 1 after the contracts expired and the providers were unwilling to continue without a valid agreement. He said passport and visa services in three countries had effectively come to a halt.
No change in services yet
As of Friday, there was no announcement from the MEA, the High Commission of India in Canberra or VFS Global regarding the resumption of routine passport, visa or Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) services in Australia.
The filing of the appeal does not, by itself, restore services. Any resumption would depend on further directions from the Supreme Court or operational decisions taken by the MEA, the concerned Indian missions and the service provider.
The disruption affects Indian citizens seeking passport renewals, OCI cards and other consular services, as well as foreign nationals applying for Indian visas. Eligible travellers may continue to use India’s e-Visa facility, where applicable, though it does not cover all visa categories or replace passport and OCI services. The High Commission continues to advise applicants requiring emergency visas to contact its consular section directly.
What the dispute is about
The case stems from petitions filed by E Trav Tech Ltd. and Verasys Ltd., which challenged the tender evaluation after failing to secure the minimum qualifying score in the technical bid stage. Since they did not qualify technically, their financial bids were not opened.
The petitioners argued that marks were deducted without adequate reasons, similar proposals received different scores across countries and undisclosed benchmarks were used during evaluation.
The Union government defended the process, stating that expert committees evaluated the bids based on the requirements of individual Indian missions and that courts should not interfere with technical assessments.
The Delhi High Court, however, held that the evaluation process contained unexplained inconsistencies and lacked adequate transparency. It said the deficiencies rendered the technical evaluation arbitrary and set aside the contract awards, while directing the MEA to conduct a fresh tender process.
The judgment also recorded E Trav’s submission that it had quoted a service fee of AUD 38 for Canberra, compared with AUD 114 quoted by the successful bidder. The court did not direct that the contract be awarded to E Trav but referred to the price difference while examining the broader challenge to the procurement process.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear the Centre’s appeal on July 20.
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