SOHAN LAL Vs. KRISHAN CHANDER RAMESH CHANDER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) A petition under Section 20 of the Arbitration Act was filed by the respondent and was tried on she Original Side of this Court as Suit No.l23-A of 1980, which was decided by Avadh Behari,J. on 24th August 1981, who held that there was an arbitration agreement between the parties and the matter had to be refered to the Delhi Hindustani Mercantile Association for arbitration and award.

(2.) THE disputes between the parties arose out of dealings between them in the period April, 1978 to September, 1979. THE seller was a firm carrying on cloth business at Delhi, the purchaser was a cloth merchant of Meerut. THE seller is a partnership firm, while the buyer is a proprietory concern. 84 bills were issued by the seller each of which had a printed term to the effect that the goods were sold subject to the Rules and Regulations of the Delhi Hindustani Mercantile Association. THEre was no express arbitration agreement set out in the bills. THE question raised before the learned Single Judge was that the arbitration agreement contained in the Rules and Regulations of the Delhi Hindustani Mercantile Association did not apply. THE question was whether those Rules and Regulations had got incorporated in the sense that the arbitration agrement contained in the Rules and Regulations had also got incorporated. THE learned Single Judge held that the Rules and Regulations of the Delhi Hindustani Mercantile Association had got incorporated, and the Act that the purchaser (now the appellant) was not a member of the Association made no difference because the Rules and Regulations also provided for an arbitration agreement between a member of the Association and a non-member. Reference was made to C.M. Grover v. M/s. Kartar Singh Phool Singh, XVIII (1980) D.L.T. 240, decided by Yogeshwar Dayal J. in this Court, and Arthur and Co. v. 8 K. awl Co., A.I.R. 1972, Bombay 345, decided by a Division Bench of the Bombay High Court, wherein it had been held in similar situation that the arbitration could be between a member of the Association in question and a non-member.

(3.) ONE of the points raised in this case during arguments before us was that the Rules and Regulations of the Association as existed in 1973 were amended in 1979. It was submitted that the 1973 Rules did not provide for arbitration between members and non-members, but the 1979 Rules did. It was further submitted that the Rules filed with the petition were the 1973 Rules which did not make provision for an arbitration between a person like the appellant and a person like the respondent. It was, therefore, submitted that there had been a miscarriage of justice. On the other hand, in the 1979 Rules it was conceded that there was a provision for arbitration between members and non-members. In this connection, the appellant filed an application under Order 41, Rule 27 of the Code of Civil Procedure, C.M. No. 2554 of 1982, in which it was contended that the appellant had lately learned that the new Rules became operative on 1st December, 1979. The old Rule was 47 (10), but the new Rules is 47 (8). It was, therefore, prayed that additional evidence be allowed to be brought on the record. This application was filed after the arguments in the appeal had been heard and judgment had been reserved, so we dismissed the application. But, we have taken into account the contentions for the purposes of examining the controversy in this case. The dealings between the parties were in the period April 1978 to September 1979. So, reference to the Rules of 1979 which are alleged to have become operative from December, 1979, is wholly unnecessary. All we have to see is whether the Rules as they existed in the period in question provided for arbitration between members and non-members.