By the Court.—This First Appeal From Order under Section 37 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (hereinafter referred to as Act, 1996), has been filed by M/s Indian Oil Corporation Ltd. Against the order of the District Judge, Varanasi dated 23.3.2013, where under Application 20C made by the appellant for the condonation of delay in filing of the application /objection under Section 34 of Act, 1996, has been rejected on two grounds : a) provisions of Section 5 of the Limitation Act do not apply in the matter of objection/application to be filed under Section 34 of the Act,1996, b) even if the benefit of Section 14 of the Limitation Act is granted to the objector-appellant then also the period taken for filing of the objection under Section 34 of the Act,1996, would be beyond maximum time limit prescribed under Section 34 proviso of the Act,1996.

2. Before dealing with the rival contentions raised on behalf of the parties it would be worthwhile to narrate the facts in short.

3. An agreement was entered into between Indian Oil Corporation Ltd. and M/s Vidyawati Construction Company, Allahabad in the matter of construction of office building and road etc. for the LPG Bottling Plant at Varanasi. The agreement admittedly contained an arbitration clause. A dispute was raised by the contracting party leading to the arbitral proceedings which were referred for Arbitrator named by the High Court.

4. The sole Arbitrator made an award on 27.4.2005. The operative portion of the award reads as under :

“For the reasons given while adjudicating upon the claims raised by the parties, the AWARD is made as hereunder:

The claimants will be entitled to Rs. 12,66,002/- awarded against their claim No. 1, but will not be entitled to any interest on the said amount, as it has been established that they had abandoned the contract and neither came for joint measurement nor settlement of final bill after termination of the contract. The claimants shall also be entitled ro Rs. 25,350/- allowed by me as refund of the sales tax. Thus, the total claim allowed by me in favour of the claimants is Rs. 12,91,352/- apart from the release of the bank guarantee of Rs. 9,46,029/-which I have ordered to be released in favour of the claimants. The respondent is entitled to Rs. 20,71,223/- on account of the work done through the alternative agency, i.e. M/s Kapoor Builders on account of extra expenditure incurred in getting the balance work done, but shall not be entitled to any interest thereon. The said counter claim was raised during the arbitration proceedings which is permissible. Thus, against the total amount awarded in favour of the respondent, i.e. Rs. 20,71,223/-, the sum of Rs. 12,91,352/- awarded in favour of the claimants is set off and the balance amount of Rs. 7,79,871/- shall have to be paid by the claimants to the respondent. The claimant shall pay the said sum of Rs. 7,79,871/- to the respondent within a period of four months from the date of publication of the award. The respondent shall be entitled to claim interest at the rate of 12% on the said amount till the receipt of the payment. I further hold that each party shall bear their own costs of the proceedings.

JUSTICE R.P.SINGH (Retd.)

Allahabad

Dated April 27,2005.”

5. It appears that an application was made by the Contractor on 21.10.2005 for an additional award being made under Section 33 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 in respect of certain disputes which were subject-matter of the arbitral proceedings but qua which no award had been made by the sole Arbitrator in his order dated 21.10.2005. To this application, objections were filed on behalf of the Indian Oil Corporation Ltd. Amongst other the objections were i.e. a) The application under Section 33 for additional award had been made beyond the prescribed period of 30 days from the date of the award and b) the contesting party had not agreed to such additional award being made by the Arbitrator, which was a c