“Has arbitration been hijacked for commercial purposes?” Supreme Court judge Justice Narasimha asks

Justice PS Narasimha, judge Supreme Court of India spoke yesterday at the India International Arbitration Centre (IIAC) at the launch of its first annual magazine, The Equilibrium.

The Supreme Court judge has questioned if arbitration in India has become an elite commercial concept, urging that the same should be utlised to deal with smaller civil conflicts and everyday disputes that clog the judicial system.

“Has arbitration been hijacked for commercial purposes?” Justice PS Narasimha asked during his address.

Stressing that arbitration should be embedded into civil court ecosystems, including grassroots centres and court-annexed mechanisms, the judge suggested that cases such as partition disputes between brothers and fights between two neighbours can easily and quickly be resolved through arbitration.

“Arbitration should become an integral part of small and simple disputes which arise and plague our system,” Justice Narasimha emphasized, and reflected on the need for accessibility rather than exclusivity.

On the success of institutional arbitration, the supreme court judge has observed that it is dependent on whether stakeholders genuinely believed in arbitration as a viable dispute resolution mechanism. “How much do we believe that arbitration as a remedy for the resolution of disputes is viable or not?” he remarked.

“Integrity is an integral part of not only of the arbitrators but also the lawyers who are assisting in completion of the arbitration. Without the total and complete integrity of both … institutional integrity is nowhere near,” the judge added.

Arbitration discourse must comment, review, criticize and appreciate the domain to identify deficiencies and improvements, Justice Narasimha said, while suggesting that the IIAC should convert the magazine being launched into a periodic platform, and it should talk about the way the institution is working, the way the world is progressing, what new experiments are possible, and how arbitration and mediation can go together.

Justice Narasimha while launching the IIAC magazine noted that,“A good newspaper is a nation talking to itself".

“Excellent, competent and capable individuals become part of the institution and they disappear… What would prevail is only the interest of the institution,” Justice Narasimha said in conclusion.

IIAC Chairperson and former Supreme Court judge, Justice Hemant Gupta also spoke at the launch, describing the newly launched magazine as a crystallisation of the centre’s three-year journey since taking charge in December 2022.

The IIAC also signed a collaboration agreement with Prayaya ADR Society and acknowledged contributors and student designers involved in the magazine’s creation.