Rs 30 crore Agra power tender FIR survives: Allahabad HC says bias claims await investigation
A division bench dismissed 17 connected writ petitions by clerks, engineers and contractors seeking to quash the FIR over tenders at the Fatehabad electricity division, holding that the defences of no role, bias in the enquiry and trivial variances are for investigation and trial.
A committee reported that participants in 50 electricity tenders in Agra had identical IP addresses, and an FIR put the loss at about Rs 30,44,24,074. On 5 November 2026 the Allahabad High Court refused to quash it. Every defence from clerks, engineers and contractors, it said, is a question for investigation and trial.
Justice Chandra Dhari Singh and Justice Tarun Saxena heard 17 connected writ petitions together, all arising from one case crime number. Justice Singh wrote the judgment. All the petitions were dismissed, and the investigation can go on.
A tender audit, a fire and an FIR
The controversy concerns the Electricity Distribution Division, Fatehabad, Agra, under Dakshinanchal Vidyut Vitran Nigam Limited. The allegations cover the tendering and execution of electrical works in 2023-24, 2024-25 and 2025-26.
On 12 November 2025 a three-member committee was set up to examine the tenders. Raj Kumar, Chief Engineer (Commercial), chaired it, with Rahul Aakad, Deputy Chief Accounts Officer, and Anju, Accounts Officer, as members. It reported on 31 December 2025.
Separately, a fire broke out in Neeraj Pathak’s office chamber on the night of 6 and 7 May 2025 and burned tender files. Mr Pathak gave information to Police Station Fatehabad on 14 May 2025. The informant alleges the destruction was deliberate. The petitioners deny it and say electronic tender data survives.
What the committee reported
The committee said the e-tender portal showed identical IP addresses for participants in 50 tenders across the three years. In 28 tenders of 2023-24 and 2024-25, it said, tender fees and earnest money were not deposited, though receipts that appeared to show payment were attached in some cases.
In 12 tenders, contracts were allegedly executed without approval of the competent committee. In 29 others, it found disregard of the lowest bidder’s rates, multiple contracts where one sufficed and wrong monetary values in contracts or purchase orders, with a loss quantified at Rs 1,10,33,845.40.
It also referred to eight tenders in which a part had allegedly not been opened, four cancelled tenders that still led to contracts, and 40 contracts whose tender notices were not displayed on the portal. The FIR put the aggregate loss at about Rs 30,44,24,074.
Somveer Singh, Superintending Engineer (Distribution) at the division, filed the complaint against Mr Pathak, other officers and employees, and contractors. It alleged fraud, forgery, manipulation of tender documents, collusion, destruction of records and abuse of position.
The complaint recorded prior approval under Section 17A of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. Case Crime No. 0014 of 2026 was registered on 10 January 2026.
Clerks, engineers and contractors
The petitioners fell into three groups. Camp assistants, stenographers, draftsmen and clerks said they held low ministerial posts with no financial or technical power, and worked under the Superintending Engineer’s directions. Tenders, they said, were handled by a competent awarding committee.
They said no wrongful gain was alleged against them, which Sections 316 and 318 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita require. An administrative enquiry report, they argued, cannot alone found a prosecution, and the fire report blamed the security guard on duty.
The petitioners who were Superintending or Chief Engineers said the report was ex parte and never given to them. One of them, Ravi Kant Mishra, said he was posted for only four and a half months, from 4 January to 23 May 2025, and that only Tender No. 22/2024-25 fell in his tenure.
They also said the committee chairman, Raj Kumar, had himself executed the agreement under Tender No. 100/2023-24, one of those criticised. That made him, they argued, a judge in his own cause.
The contractors said an award passes through many hands: the Junior Engineer, Executive Engineer, Superintending Engineer, the tender opening committee, the Chief Engineer, the finance wing and finally an ERP purchase order. A contractor, they argued, cannot manipulate that chain.
They also said the enquiry report was prepared behind their backs, with no notice or hearing, though it now brings serious civil and criminal consequences.
The contractors said the FIR showed departmental irregularity, not conspiracy or cheating. Some works, they said, fell under an emergent-works exception in the departmental manual. They called the variances of Rs 1,970 in Tender No. 95/2023-24 and Rs 14,000 in Tender No. 27/2023-24 clerical errors in ERP data entry.
On the shared IP address they said contractors in rural areas commonly use one cyber cafe. They added that 80 per cent payment had been released after measurement and certification, and that the unopened financial bid was an internal matter of the department.
The State’s Additional Government Advocate said a plain reading of the FIR disclosed cognizable offences. It named the petitioners with their capacity, tender number, date and amount, and whether they acted dishonestly or gained wrongfully was for investigation.
Section 17A and a delay of 70 days
The court took the arguments one by one. On Section 17A, it said the FIR itself records prior approval from the competent authority before registration.
The acts alleged, it said, were agreements against cancelled tenders, ante-dated agreements and purchase orders for non-bidders or second-lowest bidders. Prima facie these are not independent decisions taken in discharge of official duties, and the provision gives no blanket immunity to public servants or protection to private contractors. The court left the point open for investigation.
The delay argument also failed. The alleged period ran to 1 November 2025 and the FIR is dated 10 January 2026, within 70 days. A detailed departmental enquiry had been done in between, and tender frauds need time to collate material. The court held the delay neither inordinate nor fatal.
Clerks’ roles and the question of gain
On the clerical staff, the court noted that the report names roles with capacity, tender number, date and amount. It is alleged that their ERP IDs were used to feed data, generate general purchase orders and upload agreements.
Whether they acted on binding directions of the Superintending Engineer, or whether their IDs were misused, are disputed facts. The court refused to hold that they had no capacity:
“this Court cannot conduct a mini trial” (para 35)
On wrongful gain, the court said Sections 316 and 318 and Section 61(2), criminal conspiracy, are made out where there is dishonest intention and wrongful loss to an institution. The FIR alleges a loss of more than Rs 30 crore.
The beneficiary may be the contractor, it said, but conspiracy and abetment by officials is also punishable. The wrongful gain need not go directly to the public servant, though it needs evidence.
Enquiry report, natural justice and the FIR
The court agreed that an administrative enquiry is not substantive evidence. It held, however, that such an enquiry:
“can certainly form the basis for lodging an F.I.R.” (para 37)
The FIR, it said, is not the report itself but rests on material collected in the enquiry. Audi alteram partem applies to departmental proceedings that lead to civil consequences, but not to a preliminary enquiry that precedes an FIR. The petitioners will have a full chance to rebut during investigation and trial.
The shared cyber cafe and the unopened bid
The court gave the contractors’ points the same treatment. Whether work fell under the emergent-works exception, was within the sanctioned estimate and was satisfactorily completed is a matter of verification of records. The variances, it said, cannot be dismissed as trivial at this stage because their cumulative effect was a large loss.
The financial bid was not an internal matter where collusion is alleged. A purchase order confirming lowest-bidder status when no financial bid was opened, if proved, would point to a deep-rooted conspiracy, it said.
The cyber cafe explanation might be plausible, the court said. But put beside the allegations of non-participants becoming lowest bidders and awards without tender, a common IP address becomes a relevant circumstance for a meeting of minds under Section 61(2).
The court called it highly unnatural for different contractors to use the same cafe to complete bids, and said it needs investigation.
The chairman who signed some tenders
The bias plea rested on the chairman and a member having themselves signed or approved some of the tenders they criticised. The court said this is a defence to be taken at trial to discredit the report. The report is not a judicial order.
At this stage the court only asks whether a cognizable offence appears on a plain reading of the FIR. Whether the enquiry was vitiated by bias is for an independent investigating officer to examine.
Order
The court recalled the law on quashing from State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal (1992 Supp (1) SCC 335) and Neeharika Infrastructure Pvt. Ltd. v. State of Maharashtra (AIR 2021 SC 1918). Power under Article 226 is used sparingly, and the court does not go into the veracity of allegations or weigh a defence.
It found that “a plain reading of F.I.R. discloses cognizable offences” (para 41), involving manipulation of the ERP system, agreements against cancelled tenders, awards without publication and purchase orders for non-participants.
Finding no merit in the petitions, the court dismissed all the connected writ petitions. The judgment records Justice Singh’s thanks to his research associate, Ms Nikhat Fatima.