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Judge calls for amendment to arbitration law

By Our Legal Correspondent

New Delhi Dec. 6 . Expressing concern over the slow pace of settlement of disputes and delaying tactics in the arbitration process, the Supreme Court Judge, Justice Santosh N. Hegde, suggested amendment of Sec. 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act (ACA), 1996.

Mr. Justice Hegde was speaking after inaugurating the national conference on "Arbitration Commercial and Construction Contracts", organised jointly by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) and the Indian Council of Arbitration (ICA) here today.

He said the section encouraged ``many a party to the dispute who have suffered an award to file petitions under that section because it would give them an opportunity to delay the proceedings."

He referred to the recent proposal of the Union Law Ministry to amend the section and said: "I do hope and trust that Parliament would take up this issue at the earliest and bring about the necessary changes."

Mr. Justice Hegde said that in arbitration, delay in dispute resolution could not be attributed to any systemic defect.

"It is primarily man-made. This system unlike the parent system does not suffer from infrastructural deficiencies and can be addressed effectively with the sincere and active cooperation of lawyers, arbitrators and the Judges."

Fali Nariman, Chairman, ICA, said a panel of lawyers, judges and experts, was a far better mix in the arbitration field than a purely legal panel.

He said non-legal experts were likely to come up with the best results in arbitration making use of their expertise in focussed areas.

The ICA president, R.S Lodha, said the Council would bring out a Code of Conduct, which would establish a set of standards for the Arbitration Committee, arbitrators and counsel. Senior ICA vice-president, Yogendra Kr. Modi, felt greater acceptance of the Alternative Dispute Resolution culture would go a long way in the smooth flow of trade, business and investments, not only among businessmen within India but also between Indian and foreign businessmen.

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