Limitation Act, 1963 – s.14 – Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 – s.34 and s.37 – National Highways Act, 1956 – A land belonging to appellant was acquired under the NH Act leading to passing of an award dated 25.07.2011 – A Regular First Appeal was filed before the High Court on 20.10.2011 on an erroneous understanding – The Registry of the High Court notified certain defects on 09.11.2011 and it is said to have been received by the concerned Advocate only on 20.01.2012 – Appellant filed an application u/s.34 of the Arbitration Act before the District Judge, however, the same was dismissed on the ground that it was barred by limitation – Correctness:
Held: When the substantive remedies u/ss.34 and/or 37 of the Arbitration Act are by their very nature limited in their scope due to statutory prescription, it is necessary to interpret the limitation provisions liberally, or else, even that limited window to challenge an arbitral award will be lost – The remedies u/ss.34 and 37 are precious – Courts of law will keep in mind the need to secure and protect such a remedy while calculating the period of limitation for invoking these jurisdictions – Applying s.14 of the Limitation Act, there is sufficient cause for excluding the period commencing from 20.10.2011 to 23.02.2012 – In view of the fact that this period is excluded, the appellant will be entitled to the statutory remedy u/s.34 of the Act. [Paras 10, 11]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Headnotes prepared by: Ankit Gyan Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996.. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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