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Domestic and international commercial arbitration. Section 11, Section 34 and Section 36 proceedings under the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996. SIAC, ICC, LCIA and DIAC-administered references. Investment-treaty arbitration before ICSID and UNCITRAL tribunals.
Arbitration is the firm's preferred forum for high-value commercial disputes — when the contract permits, when the relationship between parties is one to be preserved, when the matter is technical, and when enforcement abroad is in contemplation. The firm's arbitration work covers ad-hoc and institutional references, domestic and cross-border seats, and the parallel court proceedings that arbitration almost always produces.
The Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996, as amended by the 2015, 2019 and 2021 amendments, is the working statute. The 1996 Act is structured around Part I (domestic arbitration), Part II (enforcement of foreign awards under the New York and Geneva Conventions) and a body of jurisprudence — Bhatia, BALCO, BCCI v. Kochi, Vidya Drolia, NN Global, Cox & Kings — that the firm engages with daily.
The arbitration is decided by the arbitration agreement before any tribunal is constituted.
Petitions before the Supreme Court (international) or the High Court (domestic) for appointment where parties have failed to agree.
Pleadings, evidence, cross-examination, expert testimony and final arguments before the arbitral tribunal.
Setting-aside applications before the High Court within the limitation period of three months, plus 30 days extendable.
Enforcement of awards as decrees under the CPC, including security and conditional stay.
Pre-arbitration and during-arbitration interim measures — injunctions, asset preservation and security for award.
State-investor disputes under bilateral investment treaties, including ICSID and UNCITRAL Rules proceedings.
The arbitration begins long before the first procedural order. The firm's commencement strategy covers the pre-dispute notice under Section 21 of the 1996 Act, the choice of seat and venue (Bharat Aluminium v. Kaiser Aluminium and BGS SGS Soma JV v. NHPC are the working authorities), the institutional vs ad-hoc decision, the appointment of the tribunal, and the framing of the statement of claim. A weak Section 21 notice — frequently sent without legal review — can extinguish a strong substantive case before pleadings begin.
Where parties cannot agree on the constitution of the tribunal, Section 11 petitions are filed before the Supreme Court (in international commercial arbitration) or the relevant High Court (in domestic arbitration). The 2015 amendment confined the Court's enquiry to the existence of an arbitration agreement; the post-NN Global and Vidya Drolia line of authority has refined the analysis further. The firm's Section 11 practice covers stamp-duty objections, novation challenges, tenor-of-the-clause arguments and consolidated-reference petitions.
Tribunal-stage advocacy is fundamentally different from court advocacy. Pleadings are denser and more particularised. Documentary disclosure is structured by Redfern Schedule. Witness statements substitute examination-in-chief. Cross-examination is conducted on a tight time grid. Expert evidence — forensic accountants, quantum experts, technical specialists — is frequently determinative.
The firm conducts arbitrations in the disciplines of construction (FIDIC and bespoke EPC contracts), energy (PPAs and IPP contracts), share-purchase disputes, distributorship and supply-chain disputes, and shareholder/joint-venture disputes. The work has involved arbitrations seated in New Delhi, Mumbai, Singapore, London and Paris.
Section 34 challenges are not appeals on merits. The Court's review is confined to the grounds in Section 34(2): incapacity, invalidity, lack of due notice, beyond the scope of submission, irregular composition, and the public-policy and patent-illegality grounds for domestic awards. The Supreme Court in Ssangyong Engineering and Delhi Airport Metro Express has confined the public-policy ground considerably; the firm prosecutes and defends Section 34 petitions within the discipline these authorities set.
Once a Section 34 challenge is dismissed (or once the limitation period expires), the award is enforceable as a decree under Section 36. The 2015 amendment removed the automatic stay; conditional stays now require security under Section 36(3). The firm has acted in enforcement proceedings under both Part I (domestic) and Part II (New York Convention awards), including parallel asset-tracing in cross-border enforcement.
India's bilateral investment treaty regime — including the Model BIT 2016 and treaties with the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Singapore, China and others — is undergoing reformulation. The firm advises foreign investors and Indian state entities on treaty-protection structuring, fork-in-the-road clauses, exhaustion-of-local-remedies requirements (a feature of the 2016 Model BIT), and the conduct of investor-state arbitrations under ICSID and UNCITRAL Rules.
The award is enforceable across 172 jurisdictions. The judgment is enforceable in one. The choice is not always obvious — but it is always strategic.