PRATIK VIRA Vs. ATUL SHAMJI BHARANI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This Application has been filed under Sec. 11 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 ( "the Act"), seeking reference of disputes and differences between the parties under Memorandum of Settlement dated October 31, 2018 (" MOS") to arbitration. The Applicants and the Respondents are parties who have executed the MOS after participating in the mediation at the Supreme Court's mediation centre. It is the case of the Applicants that on the very same day, the parties also executed a side letter titled as Letter of Agreement ( "LOA") which, on the face of it, is signed by the very same parties.

(2.) The LOA records that all terms and conditions of the MOS stand incorporated in it, and would govern it, and that the LOA would constitute an integral part of the MOS. The parties have also presented a joint application to the Supreme Court about the MOS since the settlement had been arrived at pursuant to the intervention of mediation center in the Supreme Court. They did not present the LOA to the Supreme Court, and it is evidently a side letter.

(3.) The case of the Applicants is that the parties have executed the MOS and the LOA, and they have consciously chosen to keep certain additional features in the LOA also executed by the parties, but they jointly agreed to keep it on the side.