HALDIA PETROCHEMCALS LTD Vs. ENGINEERS INDIA LTD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Being unoblivion of the scope of interference by the Court under Section 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996, filed against an Arbitral Award, counsels appearing for the respective parties have restricted their arguments on construction of the agreement entered into between the parties. In other words the arguments are squeezed on the proposition that the Arbitrator while interpreting the various clauses of an agreement is bound to give importance to every clauses and cannot ignore the vital clause while interpreting the agreement.

(2.) To elucidate the aforesaid points urged in the instant application under Section 34 of the said Act, salient facts involved in the case are required to be adumbrated as under :-

(3.) The respondents are basically engaged in a business of rendering consultancy services in engineering and allied works and appointed the petitioner to render the services for setting up Haldia Petrochemical Complex at Haldia, West Bengal. Three agreements were entered into for engineering, procurement and construction management and consultancy services to provide man power to project management consultant and engineering, procurement and construction management and consultancy services for pipe line. Each contracts were assigned the distinct and separate job numbers. The contract was made effective from 12th December,1995 and the work commenced in the said month and was completed on 20th March, 2000. The parties are at variance on the bills raised by the respondent for the work done by him under the aforesaid agreements. According to the petitioner the tenure of the agreement was twenty six months but it continued thereafter and, therefore, the respondents failed to adhere the time limit stipulated in the aforesaid agreements.