JUDGMENT

YOGESHWAR DAYAL, J.

(1) SPECIAL leave granted in all these three matters. Heard. As the matters have been heard at length, the appeals are being disposed of.

(2) ALL the three appeals arising out of the abovesaid special leave petitions are directed against the order passed by the Single Judge of the High court of orissa at Cuttack dated 17/06/1993 whereby the Single Judge of the High court dismissed threes Civil Revision Petition Nos. 282, 283 and 284 of 1992 filed by defendant 4, defendants 5 to 11 and defendants 1 to 3 respectively in Title Suit No. 208 of 1991. All the three civil revision petitions arose out of the common order passed by the Subordinate Judge, Athagarh in proceedings arising out of three applications filed by the aforesaid set of defendants for stay of the suit filed by the plaintiff invoking Section 3 of the Foreign Awards (Recognition and Enforcement) Act, 1961 (hereinafter referred to as the Foreign Awards Act).

(3) BEFORE we deal with the applications, it would be useful to state a few facts relevant for purposes of the decisions of these appeals.

(4) THE suit out of which the present appeals arise was filed by the plaintiff (hereinafter referred to as the borrower) before the Subordinate Judge, Cuttack for various reliefs against defendants 1 to 3 (hereinafter referred to as the suppliers); defendants 4 to 11 (hereinafter referred to as the lenders); and defendant 12, Industrial Development Bank of India, (hereinafter referred to as the guarantor). Defendant 13 in the suit is M/s Indian Metals & Ferro Alloys Ltd., (in short IMFA).

(5) 1MFA issued a global tender for setting up a captive power plant, viz., a coal-fired power plant in Choudwar, orissa. The tender indicated that credit by the suppliers will be preferred. The suppliers submitted their tenders in this regard. Since the tender indicated that suppliers credit for the entire project would be preferred, the suppliers approached defendant 4 (one of the lenders) to finance the project and inquiries were made to find out the possibilities for financial assistance by the Swedish government in the form of interest at subsidised rates. As a result of negotiations the three suppliers entered into three contracts with the plaintiff.

(6) DEFENDANT 4 (one of the lenders) formed a consortium of banks with defendants 5 to 11 and an American Bank for financing the project. The American Bank subsequently assigned its interest in favour of one of the defendant banks (lenders). The lenders entered into two credit agreements dated 30/10/1984 with the borrower. The credit agreements were also entered into by defendant 4 for itself and on behalf of defendants 5 to 11. A third credit agreement dated 15/11/1984 was also entered into between the borrower and defendant 4 (lender) in its individual capacity. It is not necessary, for the purposes of present proceedings, to mention the quantum of credit agreements except to state that two additional credit agreements were also entered into between the borrower and the lenders supplemental to the first and second credit agreements providing for additional loans. All the credit agreements inter alia purported to provide payments by the lenders to the suppliers on various documents, as provided in the credit agreements, being presented to the lenders and also against a notice of drawdown by the borrower. In relation to the third credit agreement the disbursements were to be made directly to the lenders in respect of the financial cost payable by the borrower upon notice of drawdown by the borrower.

(7) THE loans were required to be repaid by twenty (subsequently amended to eighteen) equal semi-annual (six monthly) consecutive instalments. The repayments were required to be made by the borrower without demand or notice. It was specifically provided in the credit agreements that:

"ANY amounts payable by the borrower shall be paid without set-off or