Read Time: 04 minutes

The Supreme Court on Friday expressed its concern over the pendency of execution proceedings on Arbitral awards leading to non-execution of awards pronounced 30 years ago.

A bench of Justice MR Shah and Justice BV Nagarathna said that "It is very unfortunate that even after a period of 30 years, the party in whose favour the Award is passed is not in a position to enjoy the fruit of the litigation/Award."

The bench was hearing a petition challenging the Allahabad High Cout order denying direction to the execution court to expedite the execution petition in which the Award has been passed in the year 1992 and the execution petition is of the year 2003, which is still reported to be pending.

"This is a glaring example of frustrating the arbitration proceedings under the Arbitration Act," the bench noted.

The Court has directed the Registrar General of the Allahabad High Court to submit a report on how many execution petitions to execute the Award both under the Arbitration Act, 1940 and under the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 are pending in the subordinate courts/executing courts in the entire State.

It has been observed that this is a very sorry state of affairs that even the execution proceedings to execute the Award passed under the Arbitration Act are pending for more than 20 years.

"If the Award, under the Arbitration Act, is not executed at the earliest, it will frustrate the purpose and object of the Arbitration Act as well as the Commercial Courts Act," the bench added.

The bench has further asked High Court to provide details on the number of Section 34 applications pending in the entire State and from which year and how many Section 37 applications are pending before the High Court and from which year.

Whereas, in relation to the case in hand, the bench directed the executing court to finally decide and dispose of the execution petition within a period of four weeks from the date of receipt of the present order.

Cause Title: M/S CHOPRA FABRICATORS AND MANUFACTURERS PVT. LTD. VS. BHARAT PUMPS AND COMPRESSORS LTD. & ANR.