BENGALURU: Allegations of serious irregularities in tenders floated for providing offline coaching to minority community students for competitive exams such as NEET, KCET, CLAT and Civil Services have triggered a legal row in Karnataka, with a formal notice now issued to top government officials.
A legal notice has been served by Prime Law Associates to the Chief Secretary of the state, the departmental Secretary, and the Director of the Minority Welfare Department, questioning the legality and transparency of the tender process. The notice, issued under Section 80 of the Civil Procedure Code, calls for immediate suspension of the tender process and a comprehensive independent inquiry into alleged violations.
The controversy stems from claims that the selection process for service providers tasked with coaching minority students has been manipulated through restrictive eligibility criteria and procedural lapses. According to the notice, multiple bidders had earlier flagged these discrepancies to B Z Zameer Ahmed Khan, but no corrective action was taken.
The tenders, issued by the Directorate of Minorities, aim to prepare students for key national and state-level examinations. However, the legal notice alleges that the conditions imposed violate provisions of the Karnataka Transparency in Public Procurements Act, particularly Sections 5 and 6, which mandate fairness, transparency, and open competition in public procurement.
One of the most contentious conditions highlighted is the requirement that bidders must have maintained an Android application on the Google Play Store for at least three years, with scoring linked to the number of downloads. The notice argues that this criterion has no logical connection with the quality of offline coaching services and appears designed to favour existing contractors who were earlier mandated to develop such applications.
Similarly, another eligibility clause requiring prior experience in supplying books, computers, and tablets to government departments over the past three financial years has been criticised as exclusionary. The notice claims this condition effectively restricts participation to a select group of previous vendors, thereby undermining competition.
Further concerns have been raised over the alleged mixing of goods and services within a single tender. As per procurement norms, supply of goods and provision of services must be handled through separate tendering processes. The notice points out that such deviations, along with the absence of mandatory financial approvals, amount to procedural violations.
The composition and functioning of the Tender Scrutiny Committee have also come under scrutiny. As per Section 10 of the KTPP Act, the committee must be multi-member and independent of both the tender-inviting and tender-accepting authorities. However, the notice alleges that this separation has not been maintained, raising questions about the integrity of the evaluation process.
The legal notice further calls for disclosure of all tender-related documents on the Karnataka Public Procurement Portal, including evaluation reports and contract execution records. It also seeks a performance audit of previous contracts awarded for similar coaching programmes, alleging that many contractors failed to meet performance benchmarks.
Serious allegations have also been made regarding possible fabrication or inflation of staff records such as PF and TDS documents, as well as unverifiable claims of student success rates. The notice suggests that these claims should be cross-verified with authorities such as NEET, JEE, and other examination bodies.
Invoking Section 14A of the KTPP Act, the notice recommends blacklisting contractors found to have engaged in fraudulent practices or delivered poor performance. It also calls for an audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India into contracts awarded over the past five years.
