A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court has held that individual contractors cannot claim parity of treatment with co-operative entities such as Uralungal Labour Contract Cooperative Society (ULCCS) which are given preference in awarding government contracts.
The Bench comprising Justice A. Muhamed Mustaque and Justice Shoba Annamma Eapen made the observation recently while dismissing appeals filed by various contractors and writ petitions by Builders Association of India and others challenging government orders giving preferential treatment to ULCCS while awarding contracts.
The court further observed that government orders were grounded in well-established principles and economic policies of the government with the backing of the Constitution. Their validity was not tested on the basis of loss or gain to the public exchequer.
The court pointed out that labourers who lacked the resources to compete with affluent individual contractors, forming a cooperative society to compete with such contractors who have all wherewithal, could not be considered as belonging to the same category.
The government policy of giving preference to the Society did not involve any infringement of the fundamental rights of contractors. The State’s freedom to award contracts was not the same as the fundamental right of a citizen to engage in trade and occupation, the court held.
