JUPITER RUBBER PVT. LTD Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This judgment shall decide the present appeal preferred by the appellant/claimant under Sec. 37 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 [The Act] read with Sec. 13 of the Commercial Court Act, 2015 [CC Act] assailing the impugned judgment dtd. 27/5/2020 passed by the learned Single Judge of this Court in OMP (COMM) No. 365/2017, thereby partly allowing the petition/OMP filed by the appellant/claimant under Sec. 34 of the Act where the impugned Award dtd. 26/5/2017 was challenged.

(2.) Succinctly stated, the respondent floated a tender on 25/10/2012 for supply of 1,41,309 Light Weight Ground Sheets [Goods] and pursuant thereto, an offer was made by the appellant/claimant on 26/11/2012 to supply the material @ Rs.501.00 per piece aggregating to Rs.7,07,95,809.00. This offer was accepted on 13/12/2013 inter alia incorporating that the contract was to be governed by DGS&D-229 [Directorate General of Supplies and Disposals] with upto date addendum and the conditions contained in form DGS&D-68 (Revised) [DGS&D-68 (Revised)]. The tender provided for approval of the goods through 16 numbers of advance samples representing the entire bulk supply, out of which, one number each had to be submitted to the Inspecting Officer, Indentor for each of the 14 consignees and 2 numbers for physical testing with the DIG (Prov.), Directorate General, CRPF, New Delhi and the supplies to be effected within 15 days of the receipt of the order for approval of the goods by the purchaser/respondent.

(3.) It is the admitted case that the advance samples of the goods were duly approved by the Competent Authority on 10/3/2014 and that information was received by the appellant/claimant on 17/3/2014. The delivery period [DP] of the goods as per the tender condition was four months or earlier, from the date of approval of advance samples for the entire quantity and it is common case that in view of delay on the part of the respondent in processing the approval of the samples, the DP was re-fixed from 10/3/2014 to 9/7/2014 or earlier. However, the appellant/claimant offered first lot of goods of 20477 numbers for pre-dispatch inspection on 20/5/2014, after an expiry of more than two and a half month from the date of re-fixation of DP. To cut a long story short, the delivery of goods was not done in bulk but in five lots, details of which are tabulated as under:-