Division Bench: -

Hon'ble Shri Sanjay K. Agrawal and

Hon'ble Shri Sachin Singh Rajput, JJ.

Judgment On Board

(05/05/2026)

Sanjay K. Agrawal, J

For sake of exposition, this Judgment is divided in following parts:-

The Appeal

1. Invoking the jurisdiction of this Court under Section 37 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (for short, ‘the Act of 1996’), the appellants herein have preferred this appeal calling in question legality, validity and correctness of order dated 2-5-2025 passed by the Commercial Court (District Judge Level), Nava Raipur, Atal Nagar, District Raipur in Arbitration MJC No.10/2025, by which the appellants’ objection application under Section 34 of the Act of 1996 has been rejected finding no merit.

2. The aforesaid challenge has been made on the following factual backdrop: -

Quintessential Facts

3. The respondent Raipur Development Authority (RDA) issued Notice Inviting Tender for allotment of commercial plots on lease for 30 years at Devendra Nagar, Raipur in which the appellants have made their offer for the said allotment and was declared as the highest bidder and in terms of the bid conditions, they deposited ₹ 24,38,000/- as the amount of earnest money/security deposit and the order of allotment of commercial plot was issued in his favour, and the appellants were further directed to deposit the remaining amount in two installments which he could not deposit leading to order of cancellation of allotment dated 20-11-2023 and forfeiture of earnest money by the competent authority of the RDA, which the appellants questioned in writ petition before this Court, however, this Court did not entertain the writ petition and reserved liberty in favour of the appellants to invoke the arbitration clause with an interim order for a limited period of 15 days.

4. The appellants approached the named Arbitrator i.e. the Chairman of the RDA invoking the arbitration clause and common award was passed and claim made by the appellants herein was dismissed holding that it has no substance.

5. The award was passed on 5-9-2024 and it was received by the appellants under Section 31(5) of the Act of 1996 on 18-9-2024 and the objection application under Section 34(1) of the Act of 1996 has to be filed within three months therefrom and thus, the application ought to have been filed up to 18-12-2024, however, the said application was filed on 6-1-2025 with a delay of 18 days, but within the period of 30 days which is admissible under the proviso to Section 34(3) of the Act of 1996 assigning reason that the filing of arbitration application took time in consulting Advocates from this Court and thereafter Mr. Rakesh Puri, Advocate, took his own time in perusing the documents and preparing the application and as such, the delay of 18 days in filing the objection application under Section 34(1) deserves to be condoned.

Finding of the Commercial Court

6. The Commercial Court by its impugned order, rejected the application holding that though the objection application was filed with a delay of 18 days, but sufficient cause has not been shown for filing the same with delay of 18 days leading to filing of the instant appeal under Section 37 of the Act of 1996.

Submissions on behalf of the Appellants

7. Mr. Manoj Paranjpe, learned Senior Counsel appearing on behalf of the appellants herein, would submit that the Commercial Court is absolutely unjustified in construing the sufficient cause leading to rejection of application, as the appellants have shown sufficient cause for the delay of 18 days in filing the objection application which ought to have been entertained, as rules of limitation are not meant to destroy the rights