Mahendra Sumitlal Shah v. Shankar Narayan Reddy
Case brief
What is this about?
Bombay High Court, Somasekhar Sundaresan J, June 18 2025, Arbitration Petition 31/2024, Mahendra Sumitlal Shah v. Shankar Narayan Reddy — Section 11 Arbitration and Conciliation Act 1996; appointment of Rohit Joshi as sole arbitrator; scope of Section 11 court confined to existence of validly executed arbitration agreement per Section 11(6A); existential questions for tribunal under Section 16; relies on seven-judge bench Interplay judgement (2024) 6 SCC 1, SBI General v. Krish Spinning 2024 SCC OnLine 1974, Ajay Madhusudan Patel 2024 SCC OnLine 2597; agreement dated 6 Sep 2006, Clause 16; invoked 16 Mar 2023, no reply; merits left open; costs equally borne subject to award.
What did the court decide?
Petition finally disposed of by appointing Mr. Rohit Joshi, advocate, as Sole Arbitrator for the disputes under the agreement dated September 6, 2006; order to be communicated to the arbitrator within one week; statutory Statement of Disclosure under Section 11(8) read with Section 12(1) to be filed in the Registry and furnished to the Respondent; parties to appear before the arbitrator; arbitral costs and fees to be borne equally in the first instance, subject to any final award on costs; all issues on merits expressly kept open before the arbitral tribunal.