Dear Reader,

The last couple of years have been a watershed in the Indian Arbitration scene. While the Courts across the country have done their bit to support arbitration as the preferred mode for dispute resolution within the country, the legislature gave us the most awaited change in law through the Arbitration and Conciliation (Amendment) Act, 2015. Ever since much has been said and written on the issue of the pro-arbitration stance of the two important arms of the Constitution. The push for arbitration to be the preferred medium gets a further fillip in a recent decision of the Hon’ble Delhi Court in Raffles Design International India Pvt. Ltd. & Anr.–vs–Educomp Professional Education Limited and Ors., delivered on October 7, 2016. The decision deals with three issues, beginning with the Amendment Act:-

1. Whether the provisions of the Amendment Act were applicable to the Petition?
2. If the answer to the above is in the affirmative, whether the parties had excluded application of Part 1 of the Act, since the arbitration was seated in Singapore and the governing law of the JVA was Singapore law?
3. Whether the Petitioner can approach the Delhi High Court for interim reliefs, considering it has already obtained an emergency award from the arbitral tribunal?

It brings us great pleasure to bring this update, which we hope will be useful to many of you in your ongoing proceedings.

ELP-Arbitration-Alert---Raffles-Design-International-India-Pvt-Ltd.pdf

As always we remain available for comments and/or clarifications, if any.

Regards

ELP Litigation & Dispute Resolution Team