The validity of an arbitration agreement cannot be challenged in an application to set aside an award under Section 30 of the Arbitration Act.

( 1 ) THIS is a revision against an order of the Civil Judge, Kanpur, dated 25-8-55 setting aside the order of the Munsif dated 23-10-53 by which he passed a decree in terms of the award.

( 2 ) THE facts of the case are these. The parties to the dispute are alleged to have entered into an arbitration agreement to refer their disputes to certain named arbitrators. The arbitrators gave an award which was signed by both the parties. Thereafter; an application under Section 14 of the arbitration Act was filed in the court of the Munsif by one of the arbitrators with a prayer that the award be made the rule of the court. Notices were issued to the parties concerned and the opposite parties thereupon tiled objections to the award. One of the objections raised was that the arbitration agreement had been obtained by fraud and further that the same was bad on account of vagueness.

( 3 ) THE learned Munsif found that the opposite parties had signed the arbitration agreement and the allegation of fraud by them had not been substantiated. He further held that the reference to arbitration was not vague and that the award and the reference should be read together in order to ascertain the disputes between the parties. In his opinion the evidence in the case disclosed that the disputes between the parties had been fully made clear to the arbitrators who after examining the evidence had made the award which was also signed by the parties. He was also of the opinion that it was not open to the opposite parties to challenge the agreement of reference as that was a matter which the court could not properly adjudicate upon while considering the objection as to the validity of the award.

( 4 ) THE learned Civil Judge in appeal set aside the order of the Munsif on the ground that the agreement of reference was bad for indefiniteness, and that the disputes between the parties had not been clearly mentioned in the said agreement.

( 5 ) A preliminary objection was raised by the learned counsel for the apposite parties about the maintainability of the revision. He contended that the finding recorded by the lower appellate court was a finding of fact and that the lower appellate court had not committed any illegality in the exercise of jurisdiction in making the order. On behalf of the applicant it was contended, on the other hand, that the jurisdictional fact on which the appellate court assumed jurisdiction was that the agreement of reference was vitiated by vagueness. The appellate court had no jurisdiction to enter into the question of the validity of the agreement of reference and, as such, had wrongly assumed jurisdiction in deciding a question which could not be the subject of challenge in an application to set aside the award. He relied on Chaube Jagdish Prasad v. Ganga prasad, AIR 1959 S C 492 where it was held that if an erroneous decision of a subordinate court resulted in its exercising jurisdiction not vested in it by law, a case for the exercise of power of jurisdiction by the High Court is made out.

( 6 ) THE first question, therefore, that falls to be determined is whether the learned Civil Judge had decided the jurisdictional fact erroneously and thereby assumed jurisdiction not vested in him. The argument was that the opposite parties had applied to have the award set aside on the ground that the arbitration agreement was invalid on the ground of vagueness. It was urged that in an application to set aside an award the validity of the arbitration agreement could not be challenged because it was a matter anterior to the award.

( 7 ) SECTION 30 of the Arbitration Act sets out the grounds upon which as award may be set aside. It reads thus:-

"an award shall not be set aside except on one or more of the following grounds: (a) That an arbitrator Or umpire has misconducted himself or the proceedings; (b) that an award has been made after issue of order by the court superseding the arbitration or after the arbitration proceedin