1 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 2025:CGHC:31155-DB NAFR HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR WPC No. 3465 of 2025 M/s. Jyoti Traders Jabrapara, Sarkanda, Bilaspur C.G. Through Its Proprietor Ajay Tamrakar, S/o B.K. Tamrakar Aged About 55 Years. ... Petitioner versus 1 - State Of Chhattisgarh Through The Secretary, Health And Family Welfare Department, Mantralaya, Mahanadi Bhawan, Nawa Raipur, Atal Nagar, District Raipur C.G. 2 – District, Collector And Chairman, District Health Society, District Bilaspur C.G. 3 - Commissioner, Municipal Corporation, Bilaspur, District Bilaspur C.G. 4 - Mission Director, National Health Mission, Nawa Raipur, Atal Nagar, District Raipur C.G. ... Respondents (Cause title is taken from CIS) For Petitioner : Mr. Achyut Tiwari, Advocate. For Respondents/ State : Mr. Shashank Thakur, Dy. AG For Respective Respondents : Mr. C. Jayant K. Rao and Mr. S. S. Baghel, Advocates SOURABH BHILWAR Digitally signed by SOURABH BHILWAR Date: 2025.07.09 10:33:36 +0530 2 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 Hon'ble Shri Ramesh Sinha, Chief Justice Hon'ble Shri Bibhu Datta Guru , Judge Judgment on Board Per Ramesh Sinha , Chief Justice 08.07.2025 1. Heard Mr. Achyut Tiwari, learned counsel for the petitioner. Also heard Mr. Shashank Thakur, learned Dy. Advocate General as well as Mr. C. Jayant K. Rao and Mr. S. S. Baghel, learned counsel for their respective respondents. 2. By way of this petition, the petitioner has prayed for following reliefs:- “10.1 That, this Hon'ble Court may kindly be pleased to call for the entire records from the respondent authorities pertaining to the case of the petitioner. 10.2 That, this Hon'ble Court may kindly be pleased to issue an appropriate and suitable writ(s)/ order(s)/direction(s) to the respondent authorities to consider and allow the applications/ representations (Annexure P/3) filed by the petitioner within stipulated time, in the interest of justice. 10.3 That, this Hon'ble Court may kindly be pleased to direct the respondent authorities to release the due payment of the tender amount for the work executed by the petitioner under System Tender No. 147256 dated 13.09.2023 (Annexure P/1), along with interest, in the interest of justice. 10.4 Any other relief(s) that this Hon’ble Court may deem 3 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 fit may also be granted in favour of the petitioner in the interest of justice.” 3. The facts of the case in brief is that the petitioner is a registered contractor, participated in the e-tender process initiated by respondent No. 3 on behalf of respondent No. 4, under System Tender No. 147256, dated 13.09.2023, for execution of construction of healthy and hygienic street food at Shanichari Bazar, with an estimated contract value of Rs.100.00 lakhs. The petitioner submitted his bid within the prescribed time frame and was declared the lowest (L-1) bidder by the Tender Committee on 08.10.2023. Consequently, the contract was awarded to the petitioner. In compliance with the terms and conditions of the contract, the petitioner commenced execution of the work and successfully completed approximately 90% of the total contractual work. Thereafter, the petitioner raised the first Running Bill for the work executed. However, despite such submission, no payment has been released by the respondents. Hence, the petitioner is aggrieved by the non-payment and lack of response; he submitted a representation before respondent No. 3 requesting release of the due amount. However, the said representation has not been considered or decided till date, resulting in unwarranted delay and financial hardship to the petitioner. Hence, this petition. 4. Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that the action of the 4 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 respondent department caused mental agony and financial hardship to the petitioner and the respondent department has not made any attempt in solving the hindrance. He would submit that despite submitting representation, petitioner has not been received any single penny of amount but the respondent authority has not taken any action towards the issue related to the petitioner, knowing that there is no fault on the part of the petitioner. As such, the writ petition deserves to be allowed. He relied upon the judgment of the Patna High Court in Raghoji House of Distribution Versus State of Bihar reported in 2022 SCC OnLine Pat 2368 5. On the other hand, learned respondents counsel oppose the submissions made by the learned counsel for the petitioner and submits that the writ petition as framed and filed is not maintainable as the disputed question of facts cannot be adjudicated in writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. 6. We have heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the impugned order and other documents appended with writ appeal. 7. It is settled law that the High Court should not exercise its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India when it raises disputed question of facts. 8. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of Chairman, Grid 5 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 Corpornation of Orissa Ltd. (GRIDCO) and others v. Sukamani Das (Smt.) and another, (1999) 7 SCC 298 was dealing with the question of whether the High Court had made an error in entertaining a writ petition filed seeking compensation for the death of a person due to electrocution, which had allegedly been caused due to the negligence of the authorities. The Supreme Court in the said case observed as under: "6. In our opinion, the High Court committed an error in entertaining the writ petitions even though they were not fit cases for exercising power under Article 226 of the Constitution. The High Court went wrong in proceeding on the basis that as the deaths had taken place because of electrocution as a result of the deceased coming into contact with snapped live wires of the electric transmission lines of the appellants, that "admittedly/prima facie amounted to negligence on the part of the appellants". The High Court failed to appreciate that all these cases were actions in tort and negligence was required to be established firstly by the claimants. The mere fact that the wire of the electric transmission line belonging to Appellant 1 had snapped and the deceased had come in contact with it and had died was not by itself sufficient for awarding compensation. It also required to be examined whether the wire had snapped as a result of any negligence of the appellants and under which circumstances the deceased had come in contact with the wire. In view of the specific defences raised by the appellants in each of these cases they 6 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 deserved an opportunity to prove that proper care and precautions were taken in maintaining the transmission lines and yet the wires had snapped because of circumstances beyond their control or unauthorised intervention of third parties or that the deceased had not died in the manner stated by the petitioners. These questions could not have been decided properly on the basis of affidavits only. It is the settled legal position that where disputed questions of facts are involved a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution is not a proper remedy. The High Court has not and could not have held that the disputes in these cases were raised for the sake of raising them and that there was no substance therein. The High Court should have directed the writ petitioners to approach the civil court as it was done in OJC No. 5229 of 1995." (emphasis supplied) 9. The aforesaid judgment has been relied/ reiterated by the Supreme Court in S.P.S. Rathore v. State of Haryana and others, (2005) 10 SCC 1 wherein it observed as follows: "16. In Chairman, Grid Corpn. of Orissa Ltd. (Gridco) v. Sukamani Das [(1999) 7 SCC 298] the question which arose for consideration was, can the High Court under Article 226 of the Constitution award compensation for death caused due to electrocution on account of negligence, when the liability was emphatically denied on the ground that the death had not occurred as a result of negligence, but because of an act of God or of acts of some other persons. The Court held that it is the 7 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 settled legal position that where disputed questions of facts are involved, a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution is not a proper remedy. Therefore, questions as to whether death occurred due to negligence or due to act of God or of some third person could not be decided properly on the basis of affidavits only, but should be decided by the civil court after appreciating the evidence adduced by the parties. In T.N. Electricity Board v. Sumathi [(2000) 4 SCC 543] it was held that when a disputed question of fact arises and there is clear denial of any tortious liability, remedy under Article 226 of the Constitution may not be proper. The Court carved out exception to this general rule by observing that, it should not be understood that in every case of tortious liability, recourse must be had to a suit. When there is negligence on the face of it and infringement of Article 21 is there, it cannot be said that there will be any bar to proceed under Article 226 of the Constitution." (emphasis supplied) 10. Similarly, the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Shubhas Jain v. Rajeshwari Shivam, 2021 SCC OnLine SC 562 has held as under: "26. It is well settled that the High Court exercising its extraordinary writ jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, does not adjudicate hotly disputed questions of facts. It is not for the High Court to make a comparative assessment of conflicting technical reports and decide which one is acceptable." 8 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 11. Subsequently, in Union of India Vs. Puna Hinda, (2021) 10 SCC 690, the Hon'ble Supreme Court has observed: "24. Therefore, the dispute could not be raised by way of a writ petition on the disputed questions of fact. Though, the jurisdiction of the High Court is wide but in respect of pure contractual matters in the field of private law, having no statutory flavour, are better adjudicated upon by the forum agreed to by the parties. The dispute as to whether the amount is payable or not and/or how much amount is payable are disputed questions of facts. There is no admission on the part of the appellants to infer that the amount stands crystallised. Therefore, in the absence of any acceptance of joint survey report by the competent authority, no right would accrue to the writ petitioner only because measurements cannot be undertaken after passage of time. Maybe, the resurvey cannot take place but the measurement books of the work executed from time to time would form a reasonable basis for assessing the amount due and payable to the writ petitioner, but such process could be undertaken only by the agreed forum i.e. arbitration and not by the writ court as it does not have the expertise in respect of measurements or construction of roads." 12. Recently, the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of M.P. Power Management Co. Ltd. v. Sky Power Southeast Solar India (P) Ltd., (2023) 2 SCC 703, while dealing with the issue of exercise of writ jurisdiction by a Court in matters arising out of a contract, has stated: 9 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 "82.7. The existence of an alternate remedy, is, undoubtedly, a matter to be borne in mind in declining relief in a writ petition in a contractual matter. Again, the question as to whether the writ petitioner must be told off the gates, would depend upon the nature of the claim and relief sought by the petitioner, the questions, which would have to be decided, and, most importantly, whether there are disputed questions of fact, resolution of which is necessary, as an indispensable prelude to the grant of the relief sought. Undoubtedly, while there is no prohibition, in the writ court even deciding disputed questions of fact, particularly when the dispute surrounds demystifying of documents only, the Court may relegate the party to the remedy by way of a civil suit." (emphasis supplied) 13. A reading of the aforesaid judgments makes it clear that it is well settled proposition of law that when there are disputed question of facts involved in a case, the High Court should not exercise its jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. It has been held that the remedy under Article 226 of the Constitution of India may not be proper. 14. From perusal of the pleadings, it appears that the petitioner is seeking a direction towards the respondent authorities to release the due payment of the tender amount for the work executed by the petitioner with respect to the System Tender No. 147256 dated 13.09.2023 (Annexure P/1), along with interest; is contingent upon the resolution of the disputed question of facts 10 WPC No. 3465 of 2025 raised, and these questions cannot be adjudicated under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. In view of the aforesaid, it would not be appropriate for this Court to entertain the instant writ petition as there are disputed questions of fact involved. 15. Considering the submissions advanced by learned counsel for the parties, further considering the disputed questions of law involved in this writ petition, the relief sought by the petitioner and in view of law laid down by the Supreme Court in the above- stated judgments (supra), we do not find any good ground to entertain this writ petition. 16. Accordingly, the writ petition being devoid of merit is liable to be and is hereby dismissed. However, liberty is reserved in favour of the petitioner to take recourse to other alternate remedies available to him under the law. No cost(s). Sd/- Sd/- (Bibhu Datta Guru) (Ramesh Sinha) Judge Chief Justice S.Bhilwar/ Jyoti