India court voids visa services tenders in Australia, Singapore

An Indian court has scrapped the government’s tender for outsourcing passport, visa and consular services at diplomatic missions in four countries, including Australia and Singapore, as two losing bidders argued the selection process was not fair.The Delhi High Court ordered the authorities to seek fresh bids for the contracts in the four countries, which also cover Abu Dhabi and Kuwait, finding officials failed to adequately explain how bids were evaluated and why some applicants were disqualified.The dispute has already disrupted services in Australia, where VFS Global suspended new passport and visa applications from July 1, citing instructions from the High Commission of India in Canberra.VFS Global provides governments with administrative solutions for processing passport applications and visa consular services, according to its website.The dispute affects a system that processes millions of passport, visa and consular applications each year for Indian citizens abroad and foreign nationals travelling to India, highlighting the importance of a procurement process that underpins overseas diplomatic services.The legal case was brought by two unsuccessful bidders, E Trav Tech and Verasys, challenging the procurement process. They argued that they had been unfairly excluded during the technical evaluation. The government said the courts should not interfere in decisions made by an expert committee overseeing the tender.Rejecting that argument, the court said that the failure of the authorities to record and communicate valid reasons for the technical evaluation of the bids in question strikes “at the heart of transparency, fairness and equality in public procurement”. The tender process was rendered “opaque” and “arbitrary”, the court said and deserved to be set aside.The court has allowed VFS Global to continue operating until a new contract is awarded. BLOOMBERG