(1.) By this petition, under Section 9 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act 1996 (hereinafter referred to as "the 1996 Act"), the petitioner SMS Ltd. prays for pre-arbitral injunction, restraining the respondent ONGC Ltd. from acting in furtherance of a letter dated 15th December, 2020, issued by the latter to the former. The letter reads thus:
(2.) For the sake of convenience, the petitioner and the respondent would be referred to, hereinafter in this judgment, as "SMS" and "ONGC" respectively.
(3.) On 27th June 2012, a contract, for construction of an effluent treatment plant, was executed between a consortium led by SMS and ONGC, where under the consortium was to construct the plant for ONGC.