Blitz Bureau
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has criticised lengthy arguments and excessive citations made by lawyers in arbitration appeals and suggested setting time limits for oral arguments in such matters, reported Bar and Bench.
A Bench of Justices Abhay Shreenivas Oka and Pankaj Mithal endorsed the Delhi High Court’s concerns about how arbitration appeals are conducted and highlighted serious systemic issues affecting India’s legal system.
“In several appeals arising out of Sections 34 and 37 proceedings, we have noticed that there is a tendency on the part of the senior members of the Bar to argue as if these proceedings were regular appeals under Section 96 of the Code of Civil Procedure,” the Bench said.
The observations were made while dismissing a decade-old dispute between Larsen & Toubro Limited (L&T) and Puri Construction Private Limited (PCL). The court expressed concern that senior lawyers often present minutely detailed factual arguments and cite numerous cases on the same legal points during arbitration appeals despite the limited jurisdiction of courts in such proceedings.
This approach unnecessarily extends hearings and results in overly lengthy judgments, the Bench opined. “The high monetary stakes involved in the proceedings should not result in unnecessarily long oral submissions or bulky written submissions,” the court observed and noted that such practices in effect lead to criticism of arbitration. Hence, it emphasised on the need for time limit on oral submissions in arbitration cases.
“All this results in the criticism about arbitration in India. Therefore, there is a need to impose time limit on oral submissions in such cases. We cannot forget that this Court and the High Courts have the appellate jurisdiction in civil and criminal cases. These Courts should be in a position to also devote sufficient time to the cases of the common man. What we have expressed is a matter of serious concern and introspection for everyone,” the court stated.
