* IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI Date of decision: 23^rd JANUARY, 2026 IN THE MATTER OF:

+ I.A. 25230/2025 & I.A. 25279/2025 IN ARB.P. 853/2023 VEDANTA LIMITED .....Petitioner Through: Mr Jayant Mehta, Sr. Advocate with Mr. Sulabh Rewari, Ms. Vasudha Sharma, Ms. Anwesha Singh and Mr.

Shubhansh Thakur, Advs.

versus GUJARAT STATE PETROLEUM CORPORATION LTD.

.....Respondent Through: Mr. Parag P. Tripathi, Sr. Advocate with Mr. Piyush Joshi, Ms. Sumiti Yadava, Ms. Meghna Sengupta, Ms. Vatsla Bhatia and Mr. Yagya Sharma, Mr. Aparajito Sen, Advs.

CORAM:

HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE SUBRAMONIUM PRASAD

JUDGMENT

I.A. 25279/2025

1. This Application is filed by the Respondent under Section 151 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 seeking recall of the Judgment dated 28.07.2025. This Court, by the said Judgment, allowed the Petition filed by the Petitioner under Section 11(6) of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (hereinafter referred to as „the Arbitration Act‟) and appointed the Nominee Arbitrator of the Respondent. Since the Petitioner had already appointed its Nominee Arbitrator, this Court directed the two Nominee Arbitrators to appoint the Presiding Arbitrator and constitute the Arbitral Tribunal for adjudicating the dispute which has arisen between the parties.

2. In the present Application, the principal contention of the Respondent is that this Court had no jurisdiction to entertain the Petition under Section 11 of the Arbitration Act as the Petitioner was operating the Oil & Gas Block in Barmer, Rajasthan i.e., RJ-ON-90/1 Block (hereinafter referred to as “the Gas Block”) with a foreign company as part of its consortium. According to the Respondent, the Petitioner cleverly did not implead M/s Cairn Energy Hydrocarbons Limited (hereinafter referred to as „the CEHL and M/s Oil & Natural Gas Corporation Limited (hereinafter referred to as „the ONGC) in the array of parties. It is stated that the joint venture to whom the Gas Block was awarded by the Government of India included the Petitioner herein, ONGC as well as CEHL, which is a foreign entity. For this reason, both ONGC and CEHL were necessary parties to the arbitration proceedings as well as to the Petition under Section 11 of the Arbitration Act. It is the contention of the Appellant that, since CEHL is a foreign entity, the dispute, in relation to which the Petitioner preferred the Petition under Section 11 of the Arbitration Act, was a subject matter of an international commercial arbitration and, therefore, only the Hon‟ble Supreme Court had the jurisdiction to entertain the Petition under Section 11 and this Court ought to recall its Order dated 28.07.2025. It is stated that the Order dated 28.07.2025 is a nullity.

3. Shorn of unnecessary details, the facts leading to the Petition under Section 11(6) of the Arbitration Act, are as under:

a) The Gas Block, was awarded by the Government of India to a Joint Venture comprising of various entities namely CEHL, ONGC and the Petitioner herein (collectively referred to as the “Contractors”).

b) Thereafter, the Government of India entered into a Production Sharing Contract (hereinafter referred to as "the PSC") with the Joint Venture for the Oil & Gas Block. It is stated that the Petitioner is the Operator of the Gas Block and is authorised to act on behalf of the Joint Venture.

c) On 28.12.2022, the Petitioner issued a Notice Inviting Offers along with the Request for Proposal ("RFP") and a Gas Sales Agreement (hereinafter referred to as "the GSA"), inviting offers from companies interested to offtake all or portion of gas volumes available for sale from the Gas Block. It is stated that the Clause 18 of the GSA contains an Arbitration Clause.

d) As per the requirement in the Bid Process on e-Tendering Portal i.e., Mjunction, the Respondent uploaded a signed copy of the GSA and the RFP on 12.01.2023. In addition to the above documents, the Respondent also uploaded signed Forms C1 & C6. It is pertinent to mention that the stand of the Re