SANYUKT NIRMATA Vs. DELHI DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner was awarded the contract by the respondent for construction of MIG Houses in various sectors in Rohini in pursuance to Agreement No. 2/RPD- VI/A/84-85/DDA. Disputes arose between the parties and the petitioner invoked the arbitration clause No. 25 of the General Terms and Conditions of the Agreement. The Engineer-Member, DDA in terms of the letter dated 04.01.1990 appointed Shri A. Shankaran, Additional Director General (Works), CPWD (Retd.) as the Sole Arbitrator, who entered upon reference and made and published the Award dated 28.11.1990. The petitioner filed the present suit under Sections 14 and 17 of the Arbitration Act, 1940 (hereinafter to be referred to as, the said Act ) for directions to respondent No. 2 Arbitrator to file the Award in Court and for making the said Award Rule of the Court. The respondent / DDA filed objections vide IAs No.9003/1991 under Sections 30 and 33 of the said Act.

(2.) Learned counsel for the respondent / DDA fairly stated that he would confine his submissions to only those claims which really fall within the purview of Section 30 of the said Act since the objections raised in respect of re-appraisement of facts and evidence on record would not be sustainable. In fact, the Apex Court has observed that in the absence of an award being absurd, reasonableness is not a matter to be considered by the Court as appraisement of evidence by an arbitrator is not ordinarily a matter for the court to re-examine. So long as the view taken by the arbitrator is plausible, though perhaps not the only correct view, the award cannot be examined by the Court. (M/s. Sudarsan Trading Co. v. Govt. of Kerala, AIR 1989 SC 890). It has been once again reiterated in State of U.P. v. Allied Constructions, (2003) 7 SCC 396 : 2003 (3) Arb.LR 106 that Section 30 of the said Act provides for setting aside an award only on the restrictive grounds provided in it and unless one of the conditions mentioned therein is satisfied, an award cannot be set aside. Thus, an error apparent on the face of the record would not imply closer scrutiny on the merits of the documents and material on record.

(3.) Learned counsel for the respondent, however, submitted that the award made in respect of claims No. 2 and 8 proceeds on an erroneous premise that the respondent would not be entitled to claim rebate by reason of delay in payments. Learned counsel submitted that the responsibility was on the petitioner to submit the bills in time and as per clause 7 of the Agreement, payment had to be made within one month of submission of the final bill. It was, thus, submitted that the final bill was never raised.