time, but the Tribunal has erroneously held that the GKEL is estopped from seeking compliance of contractual notice relying upon its email dated 18th March, 2012 without appreciating the context in which it was sent. Thus, the finding of the Tribunal that compliance with the contractual notice was waived with effect from March, 2012 is contrary to law. Further, in holding so, the Tribunal has prevented GKEL from raising the plea of lack of contractual notice by SEPCO in various claims, such as those pertaining to, inter alia , Grid Synchronisation (Issue No.6), fuel oil (Issue No.7), Coal (Issue No.8), UCT-PGT (Issue No.10); consequentially, the Tribunal allowed SEPCO’s claims for extension of time and prolongation costs for delay which were barred by SEPCO’s admitted failure to issue notices. In that process, the Tribunal awarded prolongation cost of Rs.70-80 crores (approx.), which consequently led to reduction in the amount of liquidated damages recoverable by GKEL from SEPCO by Rs.100 crore approximately. While dealing with the issue, the Tribunal has treated the parties unequally by applying a different standard to each of the parties by disallowing GKEL’s counter-claim amounting to more than Rs.150 crores approximately at the threshold on the basis that GKEL had failed to serve notice even though such claim for default arose after March, 2012. In that process, the total impact is for an amount more than Rs.300 crores approximately by rejecting the claim of GKEL in its counter-claim and allowing the same in favour of SEPCO.
