: The Delhi High Court has pulled up the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) over the “illogical and irrational” manner in which it granted contract for cricket coaching at the Talkatora Stadium to a sports management company.
A Bench of Justices B. D. Ahmed and Ashutosh Kumar was hearing the petition of Dronacharya awardee cricket coach Gurcharan Singh, who had alleged that his “Dronacharya Cricket Foundation was rejected by the NDMC which accepted the bid of IGMA Sports Management promoted by a cricketer who has no experience in coaching”.
Mr. Singh has trained international cricketers like Kapil Dev, Kirti Azad, Murali Karthik, etc., and has 40 years of experience in coaching.
‘Illogical evaluation’
The court, while perusing the bid documents for the contract, said, “There is no clarity as to how the evaluation was carried out. Let them [NDMC] re-evaluate properly. As of now there does not appear any rational behind it.”
“The process is illogical, irrational and we are finding it absurd,” the court further said.
“Mr. Singh was the best person to be selected as no other applicant has the kind of experience he has,” his counsel said.
Civic body cries foul
Refuting the allegations, NDMC said based on the evaluation of awards, IGMA had got seven marks and Mr.Singh’s foundation had got four marks.
The court, however, said as per the records before it, none of the coaches of IGMA had won a national award as a coach, while Mr. Singh was a Dronacharya awardee, the highest recognition for a coach in India.
The Bench said if national and international awards were a criteria, then IGMA would get zero marks.
To this, IGMA contended that its coaches had won awards and tournaments as players and the tender requirements did not specifically say that coaches had to win awards.
‘Conditions unfulfilled’
NDMC then claimed that Mr. Singh had only submitted details and certificates about himself and not that of the other coaches of his foundation, as was required under the tender conditions.
The court has now asked NDMC as to what it wishes to do in the matter, which has been posted for further hearing on February 13.
