Odisha WCD GeM Smartphone Tender (Bid No. GEM/2025/B/6479498 – 79,033 units)
Bhubaneswar : The Odisha Women & Child Development and Mission Shakti Department floated a GeM tender for “Special Purpose Telephones (Smart Phone for ICDS) – POSHAN Abhiyaan (V2)”, Bid No. GEM/2025/B/6479498, for 79,033 smartphones. According to the bid-status records, five sellers participated, but four were disqualified at the technical stage: Celkon Impex Pvt. Ltd., Global Electronics, Microworld Infosol Pvt. Ltd., and United Telelinks (Bangalore) Ltd. Only NF Infratech Service Pvt. Ltd. is shown as technically qualified. After this, the financial evaluation screen shows only one seller moving forward, with NF Infratech shown as Rank L1 at a total price of ₹931,287,726.49. When a large tender goes ahead with only one bidder in financial evaluation, competition and price discovery become limited, and it normally needs strong written justification on record.
The timeline also appears unusual. The bid was floated in July 2025, but the process continued for months and reached technical disqualifications only in December 2025. Such a long cycle is not common for routine GeM procurements. During this period, several amendments/corrigenda were issued, including Corrigendum-9 dated 16 October 2025. The corrigendum introduced or clarified important conditions such as advance sample approval, delivery counted only after sample approval (30 days), a strict service/rectification penalty framework, and service-centre coverage requirements linked to payment release. Repeated changes to key conditions during an ongoing tender can reduce predictability for bidders and may affect the level playing field.
There were also multiple clarification queries during technical evaluation across areas like ATC additional documents, bidder/OEM turnover, past performance, OEM authorization, certificates, and experience. Concerns are raised when clarifications repeat without clear closure, because it becomes difficult to understand whether all bidders got equal and meaningful opportunity to comply. The recorded disqualification reasons refer to documentation/format issues and alleged turnover inconsistencies, which, when leading to mass disqualification, often attracts questions about uniform evaluation standards.
It is also being represented that, due to the way clarifications and objections were handled, some bidders did not continue further clarification steps on the GeM portal and started seeking legal remedies for grievance redressal. Since this procurement is linked to ICDS welfare delivery, the process is expected to meet high standards of transparency, competition, non-discrimination, and value for money. When a tender shows mass disqualifications, an extended timeline, repeated amendments, and a single-bidder financial outcome, authorities are expected to place on record a detailed, speaking justification to show that rules were followed and that no bidder was unfairly treated.
