Hindustan Construction Company Limited vs National Highways Authority of India

Judicial Analysis Court Copy Headnote Facts Arguments Court observation

2023 Supreme(SC) 788

S. RAVINDRA BHAT, ARAVIND KUMAR
Hindustan Construction Company Limited – Appellant
Versus
National Highways Authority of India – Respondent

Advocates appeared:
For the Appellant :Mr. Mohit D. Ram, Advocate, Mr. Sameer Parekh, Advocate, Mr. Sumit Goel, Advocate, Ms. Sreeparna Basak, Advocate, Mr. Prateek Khandelwar, Advocate, Mr. Jayant Bajaj, Advocate, for M/s. Parekh & Co., Advocate, Mr. Mahesh Agarwal, Advocate, Mr. Rishi Agrawala, Advocate, Ms. Shruti Arora, Advocate, Mr. Anirudh Bhatia, Advocate, Mr. Devansh Srivastava, Advocate, Ms. Vidisha Swarup, Advocate, Mr. E. C. Agrawala, Advocate, Mr. George Thomas, Advocate, Dr. Swaroop George, Advocate, Mr. R. Sathish, Advocate, Mr. Mohan Das KK, Advocate, Mr. Rajesh Kumar, Advocate, Mr. Mathen Joseph, Advocate and Mrs. S. Geetha, Advocate
For the Respondent:Ms. Neetica Sharma, Advocate, Mr. Tavinder Sidhu, Advocate, Ms. Manisha Chava, Advocate, For M/s. M. V. Kini & Associates, Advocate, Mr. Sameer Parekh, Advocate, Mr. Sumit Goel, Advocate, Ms. Sreeparna Basak, Advocate, Mr. Prateek Khandelwar, Advocate, Mr. Jayant Bajaj, Advocate, for M/s. Parekh & Co., Advocate

JUDGMENT

S. Ravindra Bhat, J.

All these appeals involve decision on a common question, with respect to the interpretation of a contract condition, which required the measurement of quantities used for payment for embankment construction with soil or with pond ash. The claimants (hereafter "the contractors") contended that the measure is one and the same, which is by taking a composite cross section as a whole of the embankment and determining the volume by the average end area method. However, the supervising engineer (hereafter "EE") adopted a method, whereby the area of the cross section was bifurcated to account for the area occupied by soil and pond ash for the determination of quantum of the embankment in two different items. The contractor urged that this was contrary to the technical specification (hereafter "TS") clause 305.8; the National Highways Authority of India (hereafter "NHAI") justified the EEs interpretation. Since there have been different outcomes in all these appeals, and the impugned judgments in some of them have relied upon the judgment of the Division Ben

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2023 Supreme(SC) 788

S. RAVINDRA BHAT, ARAVIND KUMARHindustan Construction Company Limited – AppellantVersusNational Highways Authority of India – Respondent

Cases Referred (11)

S. RAVINDRA BHAT, ARAVIND KUMAR
Hindustan Construction Company Limited – Appellant
Versus
National Highways Authority of India – Respondent