Para 6.11 — GOODS_MANUAL

6.11. Payment against Time-Barred Claims Ordinarily, all claims against the Government are time-barred after a period of three years calculated from the date when the payment falls due unless the payment claim has been under correspondence. However, the limitation is saved if there is an admission of liability to pay, and a fresh period of limitation starts from the time such admission is made. The drill to be followed while dealing with time-barred claims will be decided by the Procuring Entity concerned in consultation with the paying authority. The paying authority is to ensure that no payment against such a time-barred claim is made till a decision has been taken in this regard by the CA.

2. Tender Committee: a) For all cases having financial implications of more than Rs. 50 (Rupees Fifty) lakhs, a Tender Committee (TC or called Tender Evaluation Committee TEC in some organisations) to evaluate the bids should normally comprise three members, including a finance member (nominated by the Financial Advisor) and a representative of the user, as per SoPP. TC should not be large as it may slow down the evaluation process. However, suitable domain/ technical experts may be included in the committee to render assistance in the evaluation of the bids. There is no need to constitute any other committee for technical evaluation, preliminary evaluation, etc. The representative of the Procuring Entity will work as a convenor (Member Secretary) of the TC. The TC shall be responsible for all aspects and stages of the tender evaluation. Tender committees may be constituted with the approval of one level higher than the competent authority. It is advantageous for organisations doing procurements regularly to have pre-nominated (by designation) Tender committees for various categories and value-slabs of procurements included in the SoPP. b) As per Rule 173

(xxii) of GFR 2017, no member of the tender committee should be reporting directly to any other member of such committee in case the estimated value of the procurement exceeds Rs. 50 lakhs. This provision should be ensured in the constitution of all purchase committees, irrespective of the value of procurement. The Tender Committee to consider bids may be so constituted that an authority holding powers for recommending the bids by virtue of his position as a member of the Tender Committee shall not also be the accepting authority for such tenders. c) The member secretary of the Tender Committee (or competent authority, in direct acceptance cases) shall receive the bids opened along with other documents from the Bid Opening Committee and be responsible for the safe custody of the documents and for finalising the Procurement. The bid evaluation process is described in the subsequent paragraphs of this chapter.

Chapter 7: Bid Evaluation and Award of Contract 7.1. Bid Evaluation Process 1. The evaluation of bids is one of the most significant processes of procurement and must be transparent. All bids are to be evaluated strictly based on the terms and conditions incorporated in the tender document and those stipulated by the bidders in their bids. No hearsay information or hitherto undeclared condition should be brought in while evaluating the bids. Care should be taken to ensure that preferences provided to any category of bidders on certain specified grounds do not result in a single vendor selection. Similarly, no tender enquiry condition (especially the significant/essential ones) should be overlooked/ relaxed while evaluating the bids. The aim should be to ensure that no bidder gets undue advantage at the cost of other bidders and/or at the cost of Procuring Entity.

3. Schedule of Procurement Powers (SoPP): a) There are delegations upto a threshold value (called direct acceptance threshold) below which the evaluation of the Bids may be entrusted solely and directly to the individual competent authority, without the involvement of a Tender committee or any evaluation report. He would carry out all the steps in the evaluation described below instead of the TC and directly record reasons and decisions in the file itself (or online, where such systems exist). He may ask for a Technical Suitability report from user departments if needed. b) In procurements (including nomination and SLTE modes) above such a threshold, evaluation is to be done by a Tender Committee as mentioned in sub-para 2) above.

7.2. Preparation and Vetting of Comparative Statement Except in cases upto Rs 50 Lakh (Rupees Fifty Lakh), the Procuring Entity should prepare a comparative statement of quotations (Technical and Financial) received in the order in which bids were opened. In the case of a Techno-commercial bid, the comparative statement will have information about deciding the responsiveness and eligibility of bids and evaluating the technical suitability of offers. In the case of a financial bid, it would have information about rates quoted (including taxes), discounts, if any, and any other information that has implications on the ranking of bids, etc. The concerned officers should sign the comparative statement so prepared. It may also be vetted by the associated/ integrated Finance for veracity of information.

c) Competent Authority (authority competent to approve the procurement of that value as per the SoPP)’s written approval must be taken at various stages of procurement before proceeding ahead, e.g.:

i) Administrative/ financial sanctions/ Issue of tender including Tender Documents ii) Approval of Techno commercial evaluation and Opening of price bids in case of a packet system and similar approvals in case of PQB modes and Two Stage Tendering. iii) Price Negotiations if permitted under specified circumstances. iv) Approval of Financial Evaluation and Award of contract to the selected bidder

(s) v) Cancellation of Procurement and Re-tendering vi) In some particular decisions during Contract execution, e.g., the exercise of the option clause or any variation beyond the laid down %age, forfeiture/ release of performance securities, premature termination/ foreclosure of Contract, etc.

d) Wherever such competent authority is a Minister of the Central Government (or Board of Directors in a CPSE), obtaining approvals at so many stages from them may delay the process and unnecessarily overburden them. Therefore, in such cases, their approval may only be obtained at the “Approval of Financial Evaluation and Award of contract.” Powers for approvals at intermediate stages may be delegated to appropriate levels in such cases.

e) The procuring Entity should lay down a Schedule of Procurement Powers (SoPP) detailing such thresholds. It can also lay down the powers, jurisdiction, and composition of various levels of the Tender Committee and corresponding Competent Authority for various categories of procurement and different threshold values of procurements. A suggested format for SoPP is in Annexure 4; however, the exact values of thresholds may have to be decided by the Procuring Entity in conformity with DFPR.