The court affirmed that exclusive agreements mandate adherence, allowing for interim relief to prevent irreparable harm during arbitration proceedings.

ORDER :

N. ANAND VENKATESH, J.

O.A.Nos.66 and 67 of 2025 have been filed by the applicant namely one M/s.Ennore Tank Terminals Private Limited under Section 9 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (for brevity, the Act) seeking respectively (i) for an order of interim injunction restraining the respondent namely one M/s.Indianoil Petronas Private Limited from permitting any third party connections to the respondent’s LPG pipelines and (ii) for an order of interim injunction restraining the respondent from accepting supplies of propane, butane and/or LPG through any means apart from the applicant’s facilities except by road receipts.

2. The said original applications were disposed of by a common order dated 25.2.2025. Later, the respondent filed the present applications namely Arbitration Application Nos.1352 and 1353 of 2025 seeking to vacate the common order dated 25.2.2025 passed in both O.A.Nos.66 and 67 of 2025.

3. In this common order, for the sake of convenience, the parties will be referred to as per their ranking in the said original applications.

4. Heard both.

5. The facts leading to filing ofs the present applications are as follows:

(i) The applicant is a special purpose vehicle of one M/s.IMC Limited. The respondent wanted to receive the products from the port to their LPG terminal, for which, tailor-made pipelines and other facilities would have to be created by the applicant from the applicant’s Jetty. A memorandum of understanding dated 20.4.2010 was entered into for the construction of specialised pipelines by the applicant from the applicant’s Jetty to the port boundary and usage of these specialised pipelines as well as the applicant’s Jetty by the respondent for their entire business requirements for its LPG terminal for handling the products except road receipts. The parties executed a pipeline services agreement dated 13.7.2012.

(ii) As per the agreement, the respondent specifically acknowledged and agreed to certain terms that were relied upon by the applicant and they are extracted as hereunder:

“(a) that the pipelines are being specifically created and tailor made exclusively for the respondent to handle the products (Recital 3);

(b) that the respondent would use the facilities and services of the applicant in relation to the products for their entire business requirements at the LPG Terminal, Ennore (Recital4);

(c) that the agreement shall be for a fixed period up to May 31, 2036, and that the respondent has waived its right of termination until the expiry of such term and has agreed not to abandon usage of the facilities, either wholly or partly (Clauses 2 and 24);

(d) that the respondent agrees to receive the products only through the applicant's pipelines, except road receipts (Clause 6.5);

(e) that the respondent shall maintain their pipelines in good order (Clause 6.10);

(f) that the applicant shall not be responsible for berthing delays of vessels and/or incur liability to pay any demurrage or detention charges for the vessels (Clause 14.2);

(g) that the respondent would ensure compliance of the provisions of this agreement by its affiliates and/or agents and/or public sector oil companies (Clause 16.2);

(h) that the respondent shall not transfer, assign, sublet, underlet, or grant a sub-license or encumber any of its rights granted under the agreement in respect of the services and facilities provided under this agreement without prior approval of the applicant (Clause 18);

(i) that if there is any default in the usage of the facilities by IPPL, it is considered a material breach and the affected party has the right to enforce specific performance of the agreement