The main legal point established in the judgment is that the court will not condone delay in filing a petition under Section 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 without sufficient cause, and the court's decision is based on the findings and evidence presented before the arbitral tribunal.

VIBHU BAKHRU, J.

1. National Highways Authority of India (hereafter ‘NHAI’) has filed the present petition under Section 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (hereafter ‘the Act’) assailing the arbitral award dated 31.03.2016 (hereafter ‘the impugned award’) rendered by the arbitral tribunal constituted by Shri N.K. Sharma, Shri V.S. Karandikar and Shri V. Velayutham (Presiding Arbitrator) (hereafter collectively referred to as ‘the arbitral tribunal’).

2. The impugned award was made and published by the arbitral tribunal in respect of the disputes raised by the respondent, M/s Gammon India Ltd. (hereafter ‘Gammon’) in connection with the contract dated 07.02.2006 (hereafter ‘the Agreement’) entered into between the parties.

3. The impugned award was delivered on 31.03.2016. The petition was first filed on 08.07.2016, which is beyond the period of three months as specified under Section 34(3) of the Act. Undoubtedly, in terms of the proviso to Section 34(3), the petition can also be entertained if filed within a period of thirty days beyond the period of three months; however, this is subject to this Court being satisfied that NHAI was “prevented by sufficient cause from making the application within the said period of three months.” The only reason provided by NHAI (in I.A. No. 14721/2016) for seeking condonation of delay of 9 days in filing the petition is that the authorized officer resides at Araria, Bihar and he had to send the signed copy of the documents from there. It is seen that the petition as initially filed was supported by an affidavit, which was neither attested nor signed. Further, in addition to other defects, there were blanks in the Statement of Truth. Therefore, the petition was returned as being defective. The petition was re-filed on 04.08.2016 but all the defects were not cured. The affidavit supporting the petition was also not attested and there continued to be blanks in the Statement of Truth.

4. The petition was finally re-filed on 24.11.2016. It is seen that the time taken by NHAI to re-file the petition itself exceeded the time of three months as initially available under Section 34(3) to file the petition. Interestingly, the only explanation given for delay in re-filing (in I.A. No. 14722/2016) is that the authorized officer of NHAI is residing at Goa and had to send the signed copy of the documents from there. It is further stated that the documents were received by the counsel on 28.07.2016. However, the documents bear the stamp of the Project Director, NHAI, Purnia, Bihar. The Statement of Truth filed in support of the petition is also affirmed by Mr. A.N. Singh, Project Director, NHAI, Purnia, Bihar. Therefore, this Court is at loss to appreciate the explanation that the authorised signatory resides at Goa which is held out as the solitary reason for the delay in re-filing. It, prima facie, appears that the application for delay in re-filing is merely a copy of another application and has been filed without any attention to the contents thereof. The said application is also not supported by the affidavit of a responsible officer of NHAI but is supported by an advocate’s affidavit. Be that as it may, the ground that the authorized officer is located outside Delhi and had to send the documents from the office in a different State, cannot be accepted as an excuse for a delay of over three and a half months. This can hardly be accepted as sufficient cause that prevented NHAI from re-filing the petition within the specified time.

5. A Division Bench of this Court in Delhi Development Authority vs. Durga Construction Co. 2013 (139) DRJ 133 had held that this Court would have the jurisdiction to condone delay in re-filing even beyond the period as specified under Section 34(3) of the Act; but a liberal approach to condone the delay would be unwarranted. This Court had held that