New Delhi: The Rajasthan government recently granted a contract to the company that owns the ANI news agency – ANI Media Private Limited – to ‘provide services for live streaming of the state government’s programmes’.
However, public records show that ANI Media won the contract through a tendering process after beating two other bidding companies, both of which have directors in common with it, and also postal addresses that are closely linked to each other.
A minimum of three bidders are required for a government tender to be valid. In this tendering process, there were only three bidders, and each is closely linked to the other – raising questions of propriety, conflict of interest and other irregularities in granting contracts for official work, going by the Rajasthan government’s own rules.
Official records show that three directors of ANI Media are also directors of the other two competing firms. These two firms also share a managing director, i.e. ANI Media and its competitor in the bid, Asian Film Pvt Ltd, have the same managing editor. Together, these facts ought to have raised official concerns about possible bid rigging the undermining of fair competition.
As per the Rajasthan government’s e-procurement website, these three firms — ANI Media Private Limited (bid number 2811045), Asian Films TV Private Limited (bid number 2812040) and Yellowgate Ventures (bid number 2812070) — all applied for the contract advertised by the Rajasthan government’s Department of Information and Public Relations (DIPR) or Rajasthan Samwad through a public notice on June 7, 2024.
This story was originally published in thewire.in. Read the full story here.
