Madras High Court stays tender process for widening ECR and constructing an elevated corridor

The Madras High Court on Monday stayed all further proceedings with respect to the award of tender for construction of a four lane elevated corridor from Tiruvanmiyur to Uthandi, along the East Coast Road (ECR), in Chennai and for widening the ECR to six lanes with paved shoulders.

Justice P.T. Asha granted the interim stay till January 27 pursuant to a writ petition filed by Bhopal based Dilip Buildcon Limited accusing the Tamil Nadu State Highways Authority (TANSHA) of having shown favouritism in awarding the contract to Hyderabad based KNR Constructions Limited.

Senior counsel C. Manishankar, assisted by M. Ashwin Kumar, told the judge the petitioner company, founded in 1987, had executed various projects such as the Gorakpur link Expressway, Banglore-Nidagatta six-laning work, Chandikhole-Bhadrak six laning and also built the Zuari bridge over Zurari River in Goa.

It had made a gross turnover of ₹10,348 crore in 2023-24, ₹8,765 crore in 2024-25 and its net worth was around ₹5,400 crore. Hence, the company had participated in a tender invited by TANSHA on August 25, 2025 for the ECR project and submitted its technical bid as well as financial bid through online mode.

However, on December 24, 2025, the tender inviting authority of TANSHA rejected the technical bid of the petitioner company without assigning any reason, the senior counsel said and claimed KNR Constructions was declared as the successful bidder after multiple extensions of the last date for submitting the bids.

Alleging the successful bidder had been blacklisted by the Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways in May 2025 due to collapse of certain sections of National Highway-66 in Kerala, the petitioner company claimed TANSHA had extended the time limit only to grant time for KNR Constructions to resolve the issue.

The petitioner company, in its affidavit, stated the TANSHA had initially fixed October 23, 2025 as the last date for submission of bids. However, the deadline was first extended to November 6, 2025; then to November 12, 2025 and once again to November 17, 2025 by citing administrative and technical reasons.

“This change of dates... though styled as administrative reasons, clearly demonstrates the factum that the same was done only to give preferential treatment to the fourth respondent (KNR Constructions). It ipso facto smacks arbitrariness and malafides on the part of the official respondents and it is evident that there are other political forces which are working in favour of the fourth respondent herein,” the affidavit read.

After hearing the arguments advanced by Mr. Manishankar on behalf of the petitioner, the judge granted time till January 27 for Additional Government Pleader V. Jeevagiridharan to get instructions and stayed the tender proceedings till then.