JASON LINKS I PRIVATE LIMITED Vs. MTNL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Pursuant to this application the award dated 30th March, 1995 passed by Mr.S-K.Aggarwal, Sole Arbitrator and Chief Engineer Civil Department of Telecom was filed for making the award rule of the Court Responding to the notice the respondent filed objections under Sections 15, 16, 30 & 33 of the Arbitration Act, 1940.

(2.) Respondent no.l had awarded the work of construction of cable duct 'system in Shakti Nagar Local Net works Cll) for Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited, New Delhi to the petitioner/claimant. Since certain disputes and differences arose between the parties during the execution of the said work the matter was referred for adjudication to Sole Arbitrator- respondent no.2 by the CGM, MTNL to decide and make the award regarding claims/disputes raised by the contractor(Annexure-A) and the counter claims of MTNL if any.

(3.) The validity of the award has been challenged mainly on the ground that the award suffers from legal error apparent on the face 'of it inasmuch as the Arbitrator had only decided the claims of the petitioner and refused to discuss and decide the counter claims of respondent no.1 and has further incorrectly presumed and observed that the counter claims were not referred to the Arbitrator by the appointing authority. Another legal misconduct alleged on the part of the Arbitrator is that the arguments of the petitioner were not over till 10th January, 1995 and still the learned Arbitrator refused to hear the further arguments and closed the proceedings. Thus in nutshell the award has been challenged on the ground that the Arbitrator was not competent to decide the claims of the petitioner without deciding the counter claims of the respondent and as such the award is liable to be set aside being bad in law.