POREL DASS WATER & EFFLUENT CONTROL PRIVATE LIMITED Vs. WEST BENGAL POWER DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION LIMITED

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The claimant in an arbitral proceeding under the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Act, 2006 (hereinafter referred to as the "MSME Act") has preferred the instant application under Sec. 29A of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996, (in brief, "the 1996 Act").

(2.) Learned counsel for the petitioner argues that as per Sec. 62 of the newly enacted The Mediation Act, 2023(for short, "the 2023 Act"),the MSME Act has been amended in the manner specified in its Seventh Schedule. The Seventh Schedule incorporates certain changes in Sec. 18 of the MSME Act, in particular altering sub-Sec. (2) and (3) thereof to incorporate pre-arbitration mediation instead of conciliation by the MSME Facilitation Council(hereinafter referred as "the Council").

(3.) The original sub-sec. (4) of Sec. 18 has been renumbered as sub-sec. (5). Instead, the newly-introduced sub-sec. (4) provides for arbitration by the Council or the Institution or the Centre providing alternative dispute resolution services to which it refers the matter if the mediation stands terminated.