Pam Developments Private Limited vs General Manager, Eastern Railway & Ors.

In this application under Section 11(6) of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996, as amended by Act 3 of 2016, the petitioner has prayed for

appointment of three arbitrators to constitute the arbitral proceeding for adjudication of the disputes between itself and the respondent-railway.

There is no dispute between the parties with regard to the existence of the arbitration agreement. It is also not in dispute that by a letter dated March

1, 2017, the petitioner called upon the General Manager of the respondent-railway to appoint arbitrators as per Clause 25 of the agreement dated

August 18, 2009 and Clause 64 of the General Conditions of Contract, 2001, but the latter did not appoint any arbitrator within the stipulated time

period. Therefore, the present application filed by the petitioner is well maintainable.

It appears that after the petitioner filed the present application, the General Manager of the respondent-railway has forwarded a panel of retired

railway officers to the petitioner for selecting as its nominee arbitrator from one of them.

However, since the respondent-railway did not take any step for appointment of the Arbitrator within the time stipulated in Clause 64 of the General

Conditions of Contract and the petitioner had already filed the present application, the reference to the panel of the retired railway officers by the

General Manager is of no consequence.

As per Clause 64 of the General Conditions of Contract, 2001, the disputes between the parties are required to be adjudicated by an Arbitral Tribunal

comprising two Arbitrators and one Presiding Arbitrator. Accordingly, this Court appoints Mr. Samit Talukdar, Senior Advocate as the nominee

Arbitrator for the respondent Eastern Railway and Justice Jayanta Kumar Biswas (Retired) as the nominee Arbitrator for the petitioner.

Justice Bhaskar Bhattacharya, the former Chief Justice of the High Court of Judicature at Gujrat is appointed as Presiding Arbitrator. It is made

clear that the members of the arbitral Tribunal shall be free to fix their remuneration, which shall be shared by the parties equally.

The learned Arbitral Tribunal shall also free to engage necessary staff to conduct the arbitral proceeding and the fees of the staff shall also be borne

by the parties in equal share. With the above directions, AP No.243 of 2017 stands disposed of. There will, however, be no order as to costs.