The Madras High Court on Monday stayed all further proceedings with respect to the award of tender for construction of a four lane elevated corridor from Tiruvanmiyur to Uthandi, along the East Coast Road (ECR), in Chennai and for widening the ECR to six lanes with paved shoulders.
Justice P.T. Asha granted the interim stay till January 27 pursuant to a writ petition filed by Bhopal based Dilip Buildcon Limited accusing the Tamil Nadu State Highways Authority (TANSHA) of having shown favouritism in awarding the contract to Hyderabad based KNR Constructions Limited.
Senior counsel C. Manishankar, assisted by M. Ashwin Kumar, told the judge the petitioner company, founded in 1987, had executed various projects such as the Gorakpur link Expressway, Banglore-Nidagatta six-laning work, Chandikhole-Bhadrak six laning and also built the Zuari bridge over Zurari River in Goa.
It had made a gross turnover of ₹10,348 crore in 2023-24, ₹8,765 crore in 2024-25 and its net worth was around ₹5,400 crore. Hence, the company had participated in a tender invited by TANSHA on August 25, 2025 for the ECR project and submitted its technical bid as well as financial bid through online mode.
However, on December 24, 2025, the tender inviting authority of TANSHA rejected the technical bid of the petitioner company without assigning any reason, the senior counsel said and claimed KNR Constructions was declared as the successful bidder after multiple extensions of the last date for submitting the bids.
