The case of a shrill emergency alert and a legal battle on vendor pick

New Delhi: The shrill emergency alerts that lit up millions of phones across India on Saturday brings the spotlight on an ongoing legal battle on the award of this critical public safety network project.

Germany-headquartered Utimaco Technologies has alleged irregularities in government’s selection of the implementation agency for the cell broadcast system to roll out a nationwide disaster alert mechanism, according to people in the know and a copy of the company's petition seen by Mint.

A case on the matter has been pending before the Delhi high court since 2024, with the next hearing slated for 11 May 2026.

Utimaco, which owns Israel-based emergency alert solution provider Celltick, said India's decision to assign the project to the Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT) lacked fairness and transparency. Citing the absence of an open tender, the petition said the move violated the principle of natural justice and fair competition.

C-DOT is a research and development wing of the department of telecommunications (DoT). Cell broadcasting is a global standard for quickly sending alerts via mobile phones, reaching large groups in 8–12 seconds. It supports text and multimedia messages and is widely used during disasters.

“This case has been heard since October 2024. We decided to go to court when the telecom department asked telcos to use only C-DOT technology for cell broadcast,” Ronen Daniel, head of warning solutions at Utimaco Technologies, told Mint on phone. “This, despite our technology being tested for over three years and the NDMA (National Disaster Management Authority) being satisfied with our solutions, while raising red flags over C-DOT tech.”

“We are disappointed with the manner in which DoT and C-DOT, representing the government of India, have treated us despite our good-faith engagement throughout the testing phase and the demonstration to the Honorable Prime Minister; we entered this partnership in good faith. However, we believe we have been treated unfairly,” Daniel said.

In the petition, Utimaco said the government had violated the General Financial Rules (GFR), 2017 on fair and transparent public procurement. The firm said the rules mandate procurement should ordinarily be made through a public tender, barring exceptional cases.

Per the petition, C-DOT was being awarded the project on a nomination basis "without having any relevant experience or track record and the same is arbitrary and illegal”.

The company urged the court to declare the government’s decision to appoint C-DOT as the sole implementation agency as illegal and beyond its authority, and set aside the related order disengaging Utimaco’s services and restore its earlier role in the project. The firm also sought a declaration that it is fully eligible to provide cell broadcasting services under the national disaster alert system.

“The decision also accounted for the operational risks of using multiple vendors. If each TSP (telecom service provider) had opted for a different implementation partner, it would result in different systems needing to integrate with SACHET and the Cell Broadcast Entity (CBE)," the government said in its filing. "Such fragmentation would create significant challenges related to system reliability, operational ease, and security.” A copy of the filing was seen by Mint. SACHET is a national disaster alert portal.

On the alleged violation of the General Financial Rules, government told the court that Utimaco's claim was incorrect as the call was made following "due process and not arbitrarily”.

The government said Utimaco was never given any letter of award or other commitment for a full-scale deployment. "The applicant’s claim of imminent award or engagement for cell broadcast implementation is speculative and lacks any documentary basis,” it said.

Queries emailed to DoT, home ministry, the NDMA and C-DOT on Sunday evening did not elicit any response until press time.

A 27 May 2024 letter of the NDMA to the home ministry showed DoT had recommended use of two implementation agencies for the trial: C-DOT for Reliance Jio, MTNL and BSNL and Utimaco for Airtel and Vodafone ldea. A copy of the letter was seen by Mint.

Later, in 2024, DoT asked telecom operators to use only one agency, C-DOT. This came despite NDMA's objections on some technical issues with the C-DOT technology and a possible 12-18 month delay in the project, whose initial deadline was 1 November 2023, as per the petition.

A government official said there are several projects C-DOT does for the government without any open tender. "There was a need for an indigenous solution, keeping in view national security implications as well as pricing before giving out the cell broadcast project,” the official said on the condition of anonymity.

To this argument, Utimaco said the national security factor “was never reflected as a reason for selecting C-DOT in impugned minutes/ meetings and raised for the first time in litigation as an afterthought…” It said that "basis the discussions and recommendations in good faith”, the firm spent a lot of time and resources to support the pan-India testing.

Utimaco said it has deployed solutions for 10 governments globally over the last four years. In India's Andhra Pradesh too, it has executed a public warning solution.

The cost approved for the C-DOT cell broadcasting project was ₹99.82 crore, to be funded by the government. "We believe our price is way lower than C-DoT’s,” Daniel said, adding that the cost proposals of the firm were also approved by an inter-departmental panel in 2023.