In the matter of M/s. ASR Hospitals (India) Pvt. Ltd. (“Applicant”) vs. State of Andhra Pradesh W.P. No. 17415 of 2021 dated 22^nd September, 2021

Issue:

• The Applicant is entity involved in the business of Healthcare Services, which are exempted from payment of Goods and Service Tax and as such the petitioner is exempted from registering under the GST Act.
• Instructions to Bidder requires the bidders to submit copy of Certificate of registration of GST.
• The Applicant bid for a tender after complying with all the required formalities which got rejected due to certain deficiencies. One of the deficiencies was the non-submission of GST registration certificate.
• Aggrieved by the said rejection, the Applicant has filed the present writ petition.

Order:

In the present matter, the Andhra Pradesh High Court held that the rejection of tender for not having GST registration when goods under tender liable to GST is Justified on the basis of the facts that:

• The first allegation of arbitrariness is the disqualification of the Petitioner. Instruction No.4 of “Instructions to bidder” in the tender document required the bidders to submit copy of the certificate of registration of GST, EPF, ESI with the appropriate authority valid as on the date of submission of tender documents.
• Section 23 of the Andhra Pradesh GST ACT enumerates the persons who are not liable to register themselves under the said Act which specifies that a person is exempted from the requirement of registration if he is engaged in supplying only those goods and services which are exempt from registration and does not supply any other goods or services. If such a person deals in any other goods or services, he will not be eligible for such exemption.
• Sri Chittem Venkata Reddy, the learned counsel appearing for the 2nd respondent submits that the successful tenderer would be required, as per Section IV of the Tender Documents, to supply medicines and other goods, which are not exempted under the GST Act, in the process of maintaining SNCUs, and for that reason the 2nd Respondent had required all bidders to submit GST registration certificates. submits that the successful tenderer would be required, as per Section IV of the Tender Documents, to supply medicines and other goods, which are not exempted under the GST Act, in the process of maintaining SNCUs, and for that reason the 2nd Respondent had required all bidders to submit GST registration certificates.

For the aforesaid reasons, writ petition is dismissed.