ORDER :

1. The instant petition has been filed by the petitioners challenging the order dated 31.10.2020 passed by the Commercial Court No. 1, Jaipur Metropolitan-II (hereinafter shall be referred to as ‘the Court below’) whereby application filed by the petitioners under Sections 13, 14 and 15 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (hereinafter shall be referred to as ‘the Act of 1996’) has been dismissed.

2. The facts, in nutshell, are that the Division Bench of this Court vide its order dated 02.04.2018, appointed Mr. Justice Mahesh Chandra Sharma (Retd.) as the sole Arbitrator under Section 11 of the Act of 1996. Subsequently, Mr. Justice Dinesh Chandra Somani (Retd.) was appointed as sole Arbitrator by the Division Bench vide order dated 15.12.2018. The order dated 15.12.2018 was challenged by way of review petition by the petitioners and the same was dismissed by the Division Bench vide order dated 03.01.2019.

3. The claimant-respondent filed claim petition before the sole Arbitrator seeking two sets of claims i.e. (1) for Rs. 1,05,45,760/- and (2) for Rs. 1,77,00,000/- along with interest @ 18% p.a. till its realization.

4. The sole Arbitrator vide his order dated 28.04.2019 determined his fees at Rs. 6,48,696/-, as per Section 11(14) read with Schedule-IV of the Act of 1996. The sole Arbitrator also mentioned that the claimant had not quantified the amount of interest till submission of the statement of claim/commencement of the arbitral proceedings and the parties were directed to quantify the amount of interest, as claimed in the statement of claim and the same was to be submitted on the next date of hearing. The sole Arbitrator also mentioned that after quantification of amount of interest, fees of the arbitral Tribunal was to be re-determined accordingly.

5. Thereafter, an application, quantifying the interest, was filed by the claimant and a sum of Rs. 11,17,00,000/- was claimed as interest till the submission of claim petition. The sole Arbitrator rescheduled the fees vide order dated 09.08.2019 and calculated the fees, according to sub-section (14) of Section 11 of the Act of 1996 and Schedule-IV appended thereto, at Rs. 19,21,366/-. The said amount was not paid to the sole Arbitrator and, as such, the sole Arbitrator vide proceedings dated 26.09.2019, 16.10.2019 and 30.10.2019 granted time to the petitioners, on their asking to deposit fees of arbitral Tribunal.

6. The sole Arbitrator when found that fees was not paid, passed the order dated 24.02.2020 directing the Officer-In-Charge to file a detailed affidavit asking certain explanations with regard to steps being taken for payment of arbitral Tribunal’s fees. The order dated 24.02.2020 was put to challenge by filing a review petition on 06.03.2020 and the same came to be dismissed vide order dated 22.03.2020.

7. The sole Arbitrator, after dismissing the review petition, continued the arbitral proceedings and reached upto the stage of final arguments and partly heard the matter. The sole Arbitrator on 18.10.2020 passed an order for final arguments and fixed the next date on 07.11.2020.

8. The petitioners, at that stage, filed an application under Sections 13, 14 and 15 of the Act of 1996 before the learned Court below and after considering the submissions of the petitioners and taking into account the relevant provisions of law, the Court below came to the conclusion that application filed by the petitioners has no merit and the same is an abuse of process of law and accordingly rejected the application.

9. The learned counsel for the petitioners Dr. P.C. Jain has made the following submissions:-

(A) The Court below has not considered the application filed by the petitioners in the light of the provisions contained in Sections 38 and 39 of the Act of 1996.

(B) The Court below has not considered the scope of application filed under Sections 13, 14 and 15 of the Act of 1996 and the only consideration was about mandate of Arbitrator to be terminated.

(C) The law laid