AMRITLAL MALDE Vs. NATIONAL (INDIA) CONTRACTORS AND ENGINEERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Heard through video conferencing.

(2.) The entire group is against the same Respondents. The Petitioners are the various tenants of the 1st Respondent in an old building on CS No.1138 of the Mahim Division. There was on this land a building number 74 B as also other buildings, all part of Mantri Chawl, Balbhatwadi, Gokhale Road (South), Prabhadevi, Mumbai 400025. The Petitioners in these matters were tenants of various premises. In 2005 the 1st Respondent sought to redevelop the property and obtained irrevocable written consents from the tenants. Nothing further seems to have happened until 2013, when the 1st Respondent approach the tenants with a revised redevelopment proposal. This contemplated a new building to be put up on the plot with the tenants being allotted new premises in that reconstructed building. It was pursuant to this that the 1st Respondent entered into different agreements with the Petitioners. I will take the agreement from the first matter. It is of 12th May 2014 and it relates to a shop that the Petitioners had in the old building. Some of the tenants of course were given the option of purchasing additional area and for this there was a separate Memorandum of Understanding ("MoU") for each of those tenants who desired and agreed to purchase additional area. There is no dispute that the principal agreement did contain the usual provisions for transit or displacement compensation, other payments and that there is also an arbitration provision in each of these agreements. This provides for a reference to a sole Arbitrator with the arbitration being, it is agreed, in Mumbai.

(3.) Today the Petitioners claim that they have not been paid various amounts including displacement compensation for several months (indeed, for as long as five years until November 2020).