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2003 (12) TMI 593 - SC - Companies LawWhether the proceedings in which an impugned award has come to be made, are governed by the 1940 Act or the 1996 Act ? Whether the appropriate court for the purpose of challenging the said award or seeking modification of the said award is this Court, being the court which appointed the arbitrator or an appropriate court as contemplated under Section 34 of the 1996 Act read with section 2(e) of the said Act which contemplates said court to be the principal civil court of original jurisdiction? Held that:- As noticed from the mandatory language of section 34 of the 1996 Act, that an award, when challenged under section 34 within the time stipulated therein, becomes unexecutable. There is no discretion left with the court to pass any interlocutory order in regard to the said award except to adjudicate on the correctness of the claim made by the applicant therein. Therefore, that being the legislative intent, any direction from us contrary to that, also becomes impermissible. On facts of this case, there being no exceptional situation which would compel us to ignore such statutory provision, and to use our jurisdiction under Article 142, we restrain ourselves from passing any such order, as prayed for by the applicant. However, we do notice that this automatic suspension of the execution of the award, the moment an application challenging the said award is filed under section 34 of the Act leaving no discretion in the court to put the parties on terms, in our opinion, defeats the very objective of the alternate dispute resolution system to which arbitration belongs. We do find that there is a recommendation made by the concerned Ministry to the Parliament to amend section 34 with a proposal to empower the civil court to pass suitable interim orders in such cases. In view of the urgency of such amendment, we sincerely hope that necessary steps would be taken by the authorities concerned at the earliest to bring about the required change in law. Thus this application fails and the same is dismissed with a direction to the applicant to file its objections to the award before the court concerned and if the same are filed within 30 days from today, the delay in regard to the filing of the objections as contemplated under section 34 of the 1996 Act shall be condoned by the said court since the time consumed was in bona fide prosecution of the application in a wrong forum.
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