Point of Law: Section 12 sets out grounds of challenge to person appointed as arbitrator and duty of an arbitrator appointed, to disclose any disqualification he may have.

ORDER :

Both these petitions are preferred by Doddaballapur Integrated Textile Park Limited. The petitions arise out of claims registered before the Arbitrator in two proceedings against the petitioner – one in Arbitration Case No.53 of 2020 which forms the issue in Writ Petition No.12783 of 2020 and the other in Arbitration Case No.54 of 2020 which forms the issue in Writ Petition No.12809 of 2020. The petitioner who is the respondent before the Arbitrator is common in both these cases and claimants are different. Since the issue in both these cases is common, they are taken up together and considered in this order.

2. Brief facts that lead the petitioner to this Court in the subject petitions, as borne out from the pleadings, are as follows:-

The petitioner and the respondents in both these cases who are claimants in the arbitration proceedings generate a dispute between them and did not arrive at a consensus for appointment of an Arbitrator. It is then the claimants approached this Court in C.M.P. No.376 of 2018 and 375 of 2018 respectively, seeking appointment of an Arbitrator. This Court in terms of its order dated 12-12-2019 and 09-01-2020 allows the petition and appoints a sole Arbitrator. The issue does not concern merits of the claim of the claimants or the dissent of the petitioner. In the proceedings before the Arbitrator, applications were filed by the petitioner invoking Section 16 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (‘the Act’ for short) read with Sections, 33, 34 and 37 of the Karnataka Stamp Act, 1957 and Section 49 of the Registration Act, 1908. Applications were filed seeking summoning of a sub-lease agreement dated 10-11-2016 from the possession of claimants which was not relied on by the claimants. The applications came to be rejected by order dated 07-10-2020 and it is this rejection of applications filed by the petitioner that drives the petitioner to this Court in the subject petitions.

3. Heard Sri S.Vivekananda, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner and Sri Raghuram Cadambi, learned counsel appearing for respondent No.1 in both the petitions.

4. The learned counsel appearing for the petitioner would contend that summoning of sub-lease agreement was imperative as the Arbitrator would get jurisdiction only if the said agreement is summoned and if it is inadequately stamped it should be impounded by the Arbitrator, failing which the Arbitrator cannot adjudicate upon the dispute at all. It is therefore, the contention is that the said document was imperative to be summoned and the rejection of the applications is contrary to law.

5. On the other hand, the learned counsel representing the claimants would vehemently refute the submissions of the petitioner to contend that the document is not the one which would be required to arbitrate, as the claimants are not required to prove the claim through the said document. He further contends that a writ petition challenging an interlocutory order passed by the Arbitrator is not maintainable before this Court in the light of judgments of the Apex Court rendered from time to time. He would, therefore, contend that there is a threshold bar qua maintainability of the petition before this Court.

6. I have given my anxious consideration to the submissions made by the respective learned counsel and have perused the material on record.

7. The afore-narrated facts are not in dispute. It is also not in dispute that applications filed under Section 16 of the Act were rejected by the Arbitrator. Therefore, the order becomes interlocutory order during the pendency of proceedings before the Arbitrator. In these circumstances, whether the writ petitions against interlocutory orders would be maintainable or otherwise requires to be gone into, at the outset, as the issue of maintainability would always cut at the root of the matter. Therefore, the issues that arise for consideration are two fold –

(i) whether writ petitions challenging an interlocutory order of rejection of